It’s a tiled floor mosaic but I saw it this week lifted onto the wall of the Ashmolean museum in Oxford, and it was beautiful and affecting. The Romans thought about life differently. They knew death was waiting, that it’s present even in the happiest of times, even in the midst of the feast. That’s not depressing, it’s simply the truth, neither good nor bad.
Death carries the wine jugs to remind us it’s not time yet. We can still eat. We can still drink, We can love and laugh. Luckily for us, there’s still time. But not enough to waste.