“Centuries”
Rage against the dying of the light with Fall Out Boy’s memento mori/carpe diem anthem; a worthy addition to the canon.
“Threshold: the choir who sing to the dying”
‘Let it be like a lullaby that holds you.’ Threshold Choir is an international charity that provides people who are dying with soothing, non-religious songs of peace and comfort, sung by three-person volunteer groups. This short documentary profiles one Threshold Choir chapter in Devon in south-west England.
“The Little Book of Maudism” (2016)
I can’t recall the first time I saw the countercultural classic movie Harold and Maude, but I’m sure that I was too young then to pick up on the film’s bittersweet, positive existentialist message except in very broad strokes. Sometime around 2020 – peak pandemic – I became aware that English author Lucy Coleman Talbot … Read more“The Little Book of Maudism” (2016)
Floralia 2026
Living in the future … the first wildflowers are appearing in the park and along the riverbanks, trees are budding or starting to leaf, and so another Floralia has arrived. I’ve repositioned the skull on my vanitas shrine – facing to the right, symbolizing “looking forward” – and re-dressed the flowered caplet in honor of … Read moreFloralia 2026
Memento Mori Religion in “28 Years Later”
In the 28 Days franchise, much of the world is laid to waste by an accidentally-released pathogen called the Rage Virus, which reduces human beings to almost mindless biting and eating machines. The third installment is set 28 years after the original movie and takes place in a radically re-wilded England. Nature has largely reclaimed … Read moreMemento Mori Religion in “28 Years Later”
“After the Rain”
Japanese conceptual artist Aya Kichi describes “After the Rain”: (…) incorporating a series of optical prisms into the centres of tombstones, which as a result, create a spectrum of light on the ground where the grave would be situated. Influenced by rainy days and the grieving process, the project takes these elements and translates them … Read more“After the Rain”
“… the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts …”
“Her finely-touched spirit had still its fine issues, though they were not widely visible. Her full nature, like that river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on the earth. But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good … Read more“… the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts …”
“How to become a tree”
Cultural anthropologist writes for Aeon on the question of whether green funeral option are really all that green: In recent years, interest in green death has surged in the West, as the human impact on the Earth has become clearer. Far from a destructive or polluting act, human burial is being reframed as a chance … Read more“How to become a tree”