Better Just To Listen

About the time he seems ready to hope, there is no reason to.  He tells me this a lot and I used to tell him he was wrong.  I would say life was the gift and just by living he was ahead.  He did not argue.  I don't tell him that anymore, or anything else.  Instead I listen, and sometimes I nod.  He told me it would be all right if life ended.  He would not give back the gift, but it would be O.K. not to have it.