FROM all the rest I single out you, having a message for you: <br /> You are to die--Let others tell you what they please, I cannot <br /> prevaricate, <br /> I am exact and merciless, but I love you--There is no escape for you. <br /> <br /> Softly I lay my right hand upon you--you just feel it, <br /> I do not argue--I bend my head close, and half envelope it, <br /> I sit quietly by--I remain faithful, <br /> I am more than nurse, more than parent or neighbor, <br /> I absolve you from all except yourself, spiritual, bodily--that is <br /> eternal--you yourself will surely escape, <br /> The corpse you will leave will be but excrementitious. <br /> <br /> <br /> The sun bursts through in unlooked-for directions! 10 <br /> Strong thoughts fill you, and confidence--you smile! <br /> You forget you are sick, as I forget you are sick, <br /> You do not see the medicines--you do not mind the weeping friends--I <br /> am with you, <br /> I exclude others from you--there is nothing to be commiserated, <br /> I do not commiserate--I congratulate you.<br /><br />Walt Whitman<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-one-shortly-to-die/
