It is not so only in man. Animal watchers also say animals look very sad after making love. When you make love, life takes a flight, and when life is very much there you become aware, in contrast, of death too. Awareness happens only in contrast. That’s why in the night you can see the stars in the sky, not in the day. In the day there is no contrast; the sunlight is so much, you cannot see the stars in the day. But in the night, when the sun is gone and all is dark, stars start appearing. What happens? The contrast of darkness is needed for them to appear, just as you write with white chalk on a blackboard.

If you move deeply into life, love, sex, suddenly you will become aware of death surrounding you from everywhere. That’s why man became afraid of sex and religions became repressive of sex. It is not just an invention of some theologians; there is some deep psychological reason for it. Man became aware of one thing: that whenever you move to the peak of love, suddenly you become aware of the deep, deep, abysmal valley surrounding it. And fear takes grip of you, you start feeling nauseous, shaky; trembling arises in you. How to avoid this trembling? The only way that was found was to avoid the peak, so that you never come across the valley – avoid sex, so you never become aware of death.

You will be surprised to know that it is really death that has made people afraid of sex. And all the people who are afraid of sex are cowards, naturally. It has to be so. It is because of the fear of death that they have become inhibitive of sex; hence they are cowards.

And the second taboo is death: don’t talk of death; it is thought to be unmannerly. Don’t bring death into a conversation; it is thought to be uneducated, vulgar. Keep death out of life, as if it doesn’t exist. At least believe that it doesn’t exist. That’s why cemeteries are made outside of the town, so that we don’t come across them; or cemeteries are made in such a beautiful way – gardens, flowers, marble graves – to hide the phenomenon of death. And people believe in the immortality of the soul – not that they know – but only so that they can go on living with this illusion that death is unreal.

Just as in the moment of sexual ecstasy you become aware of death, the same happens when you are dying or you are on the verge of death: you become aware of your whole sexuality, of your whole sexual being. It is a well-known fact that when people are hanged, the last thing that happens to them is ejaculation. When a person is murdered on a gallows, the last thing that happens is ejaculation. Why? Death brings the other pole into vision.

People who are dying almost always die with sexual fantasies surrounding them, and that is natural because this is the way they will enter into another womb immediately. Here they are dying, the body is disappearing, they are losing their roots in this body, and their fantasy is already searching for a new womb, for a new body, for a new sexuality. In the moment of death people become aware very much of sexuality. The dying person almost always has an erection; even old people, very old people, will have erections when they are dying. What happens? Life is trying to assert itself at the last moment too. Life is trying to overcome death.