Catal Huyuk, Central Anatolia, 7400 to 6200 BC, vultures depicted reaching for headless human bodies (originals are drawn in red)

I had walked since dawn and lay down to rest on a

     bare hillside

Above the ocean. I saw through half-shut eyelids a

     vulture wheeling high up in heaven,

And presently it passed again, but lower and nearer,

     its orbit narrowing,

     I understood then

That I was under inspection. I lay death-still and

     heard the flight feathers

Whistle above me and make their circle and come

     nearer…

. . . how beautiful he looked, gliding down

On those great sails; how beautiful he looked,

     veering away in the sea-light

     over the precipice. I tell you solemnly

That I was sorry to have disappointed him. To be

     eaten by that beak and

     become part of him, to share those wings and

     those eyes –

What a sublime end of one’s body, what an ensky-

     ment; what a life after death.