Deathbed etiquette for a grumpy old man (Ich habe genug)

Be still, please, just be still, and quiet too, lest your loose tongue intrudes, when dumbness is by far the best response. In case my physical repose leads you astray, know this, my dears, that much is going on, in which you now play minor parts. Know your place. You had your chance. This is my show now. Stop and listen with me while I assess this final time; when chickens homeward come, jigsaw thoughts fall into place, warning signals flash, and gentle harmonies vie with strident chords for my attention. Don’t interrupt this final drama with puerile assurances of paradise to come, or reunions, or salvation. At this time it just may be that I know more of these than you. Perhaps you speak with well-intentioned ignorance, of ideas arising more from dogma than from knowledge. For me this final warm enfolding ignorance, is welcome and I seek no more the resolution of contradiction and paradox. I do not need your psalms and songs. Enough it is that Bach and Rembrandt walk with me – …and Jesus. Tunes, images and visions draw me on. Do not speak to me, or of me, with forced jollity. Do not pray over me. Do not bless me. Don’t belabor me with sheep and shepherds, with valleys green and running waters. Don’t burden me with religion. No angels, if you don’t mind. My devils live within me still and you, for all your mumbo-jumbo, will not banish them from these last thoughts. You, who lived with me, around me, for me, against me may do one thing, and one alone. You may do what I in my fragility have never sought, and you, in your haste, have never offered. You may hold my hand Steadily, firmly, silently, without the nervous pats and anxious strokes that speak more of you than me, and you may offer me quiet, steady, encompassing forgiveness, for all the many ills that I have left behind; for all the shards of well-meant deeds left shattered and scattered in your path. © Karel Reus