We went to the crystal palace. We found all kinds of glimmering rocks, many of them beautiful enough to break our hearts. We thought some looked like frozen fire, others could almost be read as satellite imagery of earth. These rocks tended to be ancient - signs saying “100 million years old” or “210 million years old” were quite common. Quartz formations as big as people. An amethyst geode four meters high.

And then there was the skull. An unfortunate ram had fallen into a cavity some aeons ago. Make that ten thousand years, I really don’t know. Nature chose to grow a myriad of crystals on the ram’s skull, just because. Then the skull was found in that cave. Then it was brought to the crystal palace, to our wonder & amazement.

We learned this: nature doesn’t know and doesn’t care, so it can make death beautiful.