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Perhaps it is unknowable.

Death does not need you to

understand it.

Death requires nothing.

Before you reach death, you

must try to pass your

instructions along.

This, too, is an instruction.

But it shouldn’t be taken too

literally. It can mean a lot of

different things.

The second ingredient a parent

passes to their offspring is

food—something for the

new life-form to construct a

simple body out of before it

can graduate to external energy

sources, like sunlight or soil.

Leaves. Fruit. Nectar. Flesh.

Every human that has

ever lived has dined heavily

on the food sources

nonhuman species provide

to their embryos. The oily,

starchy meat of seeds.

The vitamin-rich

yolk of eggs.

In many societies across

the whole of our existence,

the bulk of what a person