The funeral procession in the city streets is ominously pathetic. Behind the car that bears the corpse comes the bus, or the black buses, filled with mourners, relatives, and friends. The two or three people crying, those for whom it truly hurts, are disgusted by the honking of passing cars, the shouts of the street hawkers, the laughter of the transients, the terrible indifference of the world. The hearse advances, idles, moves off again, and one begins to think that even the dead will have to respect the traffic signals. It’s an urban funeral, decent and expedient. 

It has neither the solemnity nor the tenderness of a country funeral. I once saw a farmer walking with a little white coffin on his shoulders. It was a girl, his daughter perhaps. There was no one behind him, not even one of those neighbors who would cover her face with a shawl and act serious, as though she were brooding on death. He walked alone, in the middle of the street, holding his with the same hand that gripped the white box. Walking through the centre of the village, four cars trailed him, four cars full of strangers who hadn’t dared to overtake him.

For sure I don’t want to be buried. But if one day it should happen, I would rather be buried in the cellar of my house than traipse dead through these streets of God without anyone paying any heed to me. Because if I deeply love this wonderful indifference of the world to my existence, I also fervently desire that my corpse be respected.