There is nothing death-like about dead fish. Maybe because they don't have arms or legs or feathers or fur, their bodies are so continuous , so firm, so compact, like fruits or vegetables. Maybe because they don't have a tongue to stick out. Oh yes, and probably because they don't shut their eyes in death. And maybe because of their stainless-steel gleam, the glossy exterior - not to be seen in birds or animals - caused by millions of years of continuous washing.

Even dried fish look so aesthetic, they look as if someone crafted them out of porous, flaky wood. Not at all like mummified dead bodies. And the eyes just don't die.

These days whenever I go home I make it a point to visit the fish market, and there see these basketfuls of fish gleaming silver in the sun. Fish of all shapes and sizes and some with such exotic patterns on them that you wonder what need of natural camouflage might have necessiated that evolution. Nothing thrills me so much as the sight of a Pompfret and not just because I might be able to eat it.

Anyways here's the painting that inspired this post: Van Gough's Still Life With Mackerels, Lemons and Tomatoes . One of the two fish does look a bit dead, I admit, because Van Gough has placed it upside down and put its mouth open.