Food for thought

What is death and when does it happen.Is it once one ceases to exist,when the body turns into ashes and all that is left are bones or when it is an individual is forgotten.We talk of some of the greats Leonardo De Vinci,Aristotle and Sigmund Freud as if they are still amongst us.In reality we are speaking of what they have contributed and brought into our lives.So how does when feel when they are alive but are as forgetable as a fly that zooms across us.Are they not also dead in a way,nothing more than a wall paper in this wonderus work of architect we call the world.Again I ask what is death!If one loses sight,faith,will,hope,the ability to love and empathise are they not also dead somehow?It would seem death has touched the very essence of their being.A crueler fate than the conventional death where someone is gone from the realm of the living.A walking body with no emotions or aspirations for tomorrow nothing more than the zombies we read of in books and see in movies.Death really is ambigious and inevitable and yet some seek it while others spend thei whole lives trying to cheat it.Even aging itself is part of death,death of ones youth but with it comes with experience and wisdom.So is death truely as horrible as we see it or a beggining to another adventure?It has fascinated as from the ages and yet it seems the mystics of old were closer to an answer than we are today.Life is defined with birth and death,we live only to die so should we not cherish the time inbetweena and all we can to reach our fullest?And yet their are those whose spirits have been beaten and pounded to nothingness and are no longer.What of those people can we really say they are alive and living or are they as dead as the rotten,decaying corpses since the days of old?Death!As old as time itself as revered as the Gods and talked about in all faiths a puzzling phenomenon as the Hell and Heaven gates.