Why The Gods Failed To Teach People About Death

When people come, how,  a god wondered, 
shall we teach them about death?

Won't they learn by themselves?  

They will think it a sleep from which no one wakes.

Or from which one does.

We can show them shooting stars.

They will only think them wonderful.

We can show them carcasses with one eye  that are buried in the sand.  
Or snakeskins draped like threads 
across the cracked beds of ancient rivers..

Then a  mist blotted out the sun. 
 When it cleared, the gods were gone. 
 In their place a tree the color of copper grew out of sand.
 Then the tree was gone and a bird, its wings the size of boul-
ders, stood where it had been. Then where the bird had been, 
a snail shaped like an ear listened to the air. 
Then a gentle breeze blew, and where it  blew, 
there was the feel of flowing water and then the sound,
 and then seven gods stood on the horizon 
where the sound had been. 

And that is why we cannot teach them,  said the seventh god.

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