The body disintegrates, the brain shuts down and this carbon based life form—you, me, all whom we love, the bird flying freely in the sky, the dog barking petulantly outside my window—ends its existence.
Read MoreA bronze of Sembiyan Mahadevi, a queen from the Chola dynasty in Southern India, around 10th century CE—my photo from the Freer Sackler Gallery in Washington D.C.