Angel of small death

"By all means. You must be very busy." Han said, uncharacteristic cheer coloring his voice and a dangerously insincere grin splitting his face in two. Despite giving her leave to resume her duties, and despite being entirely too large to sit comfortably in her chair, the demon looked quite settled behind Hae'iel's desk.

He followed the angle of her tired glower to his muddy bootheels. Hanael's glib smile drooped into a glib frown, as if noticing for the first time that he'd set them atop a stack of critical paperwork. Gingerly, Han raised his heel and plucked off the soiled paper that stuck to it. He knew what it said already, but he faced it to Hae'iel to make sure she did too:

DISCREPANCY REPORT SCHWARTZ, AUDRA

It wasn’t the muck that bothered her; she saw feces and worse every day as she worked. Death was not often as clean and dignified as people might hope.

The skull of a buried german soldier containing an entire root system.

“Don’t work with death, because then you invite it into your house.”

Death is already in my house. Death is everywhere. Death is what decays the plant matter that feeds my garden. Death is what feeds the herbs I use in my spells, for each grows from what died before it.

Death is what feeds my family - death of plants, the death of animals. I would not disrespect the spirits of that which feeds us by ignoring their sacrifice. 

Death is the veil between my ancestors and myself, keeping them at rest and then acting as the gate for them to step into their next life.

When I do hospice work and sit with someone who is accepting their approaching death, I don’t tell them death is something to fear or avoid. I tell them death is the friend that walked beside them, every step of their life, maintaining the balance of the world, and waiting for them with open arms, to escort them to rebirth. 

“Don’t work with death!”