A water snake glided smoothly up the pool, twisting its periscope head from side to side; and it swam the length of the pool and came to the legs of a motionless heron that stood in the shadows. A silent head and beak lanced down and plucked it out by the head, and the beak swallowed the little snake while its tail waved frantically.
John SteinbeckLife cannot be cut off quickly. One cannot be dead until the things he changed are dead. His effect is the only evidence of his life. While there remains even a plaintive memory, a person cannot be cut off, dead. And he thought, โItโs a long slow process for a human to die. We kill a cow, and it is dead as soon as the meat is eaten, but a manโs life dies as a commotion in a still pool dies, in little waves, spreading and growing back toward stillness.
John Steinbeck