Good-bye my Fancy!
Farewell dear mate, dear love!
I'm going away,
I know not where,
Or to what fortune, or whether I may ever see you again,
So Good-bye my Fancy.
Now for my last-let me look back a moment;
The slower fainter ticking of the clock is in me,
Exit, nightfall, and soon the heart-thud stopping.
Long have we lived, joy'd, caress'd together;
Delightful!-now separation-Good-bye my Fancy.
Yet let me not be too hasty,
Long indeed have we lived, slept, filter'd, become reallyblended into one;
Then if we die we die together, (yes,we'll remain one,)If we go anywhere we'll be better off and blither, and learn something,
May-be it is yourself now really ushering meto the true songs, (who knows?)May-be it is you the mortal knob really undoing, turning-so now finally,
Good-bye-and hail! my Fancy!
Whitman wrote this poem in 1891,a year before his death.
