Last Rites

Dishes clanging, water splashing, people yelling up and down the hallway. As the floor is finally mopped clean, the dishes put away and the water let out the drain, the chaos is suddenly intruded upon by a mournful silence. Silence is never to be found in this city, and yet today silence has found us here. Patients gather 'round the bed, prayers are lifted like incense to heaven as tears roll drearily down our cheeks. A brother. A father. A son. Now Spirit. From the centre of the semi-circular crowd, a future priest leads in a prayer of thanksgiving, of loss, for this our dearly departed. Lying in our midst, body covered in hand-woven linen, flies buzzing about and spirit fleeting, we remember who he was to us. Perhaps the few things we were able to do for him while he breathed his last breaths in this place. My throat chokes up. A tear traces my cheek like so many others. I did not know this man, and yet at the time of his last rites, I recognise in him, myself. I too am frail. I too will die. Whether indistinctly in a hospice bed or not, my life too will expire. When that happens... When that happens, I wonder what people will say. I wonder what they will do. Will they too gather around my bed and say "I didn't know him well..." or "He was a good man..." or "His last days were so hard - he's in a better place..." Who knows. We'll leave that for the appropriate juncture in history. His eyes are made to be closed. The linen bedclothes raised over his head, flowers placed lovingly, one by one upon his chest as we pay our last respects to one like us. A human being. Our kindred. And as the last of us walk by, prepare to leave this silence for the chaos outside, we commit his spirit unto Your care... In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.