The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot unveil the mystery of light.  If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide into the body of life.  For life and death are one, as the river and sea are one.

In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond, and like seeds dreaming beneath the snow, your heart dreams of spring.

Trust your dreams for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.  Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king, whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.  Is the shepherd not joyful beneath his trembling that he shall wear the mark of the king?  Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and melt in the sun?  And what is it but to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its breathless tides that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you begin to sing.  And when you have reached the mountain top, then shall you begin to climb.  And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

From "Death," by Kahlil Gibran
http://www.prostatepointers.org/circle/gibran.html