I don’t mean to be morbid – but when I saw the fragile dead body, it really made me think. When life seeps out of the body, there is nothing left but a mass of biodegradable waste, and yet it is that biodegradable waste that we hanker for, love, hate and worship. As ‘beauty’ is sold as a concept, as a way of life, as a necessisity, we really wonder why we chase after something so ephemeral. Tons of times we are reminded that it is the inner beauty that one must look out for, but only until we see the decay of the outer self, that we realise the sheer truth of that statement. The outer blinds us, because it is simply more pleasing to see ‘pretty’ things.

When we form deep attachments to people, do we realise that we are not forming them to their body, which will fade; we are not forming to their heart, mind or personality, because that is an abstract concept that disappears the moment life remains no more; we are forming an attachment to things that will no longer exist – except in our memory. Is that why humans have a strange fondness for pictures and photos? The longing to preserve moments, time and people beyond their span of existence.

We can claim that we love the soul, the inexplicable part of a person that is entwined in karma and all things mysterious, but can we feel that soul, is it tactile enough for us to love it and miss it? We can spend our entire life loving things and people, and desperately trying to hold on to those we love, when all along, they are destined to disappear in a poof.