EXIT LINES: Semi-official last words of verious citizens, famous and otherwise, with elaborations by D. McClellan
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Rabelais, d.1555
I am going to seek the great
perhaps
Fear
of the hereafter makes cowards, shrinks the appetite.
I
go beyond the shadow of any church, the taste of life,
like
a fresh onion on my lips: a song, banging in my ears
like
a giant’s fart. My will and testament––I have nothing,
I
owe a great deal, the rest I leave to the poor.
The
solace of certainty I leave to all you quaking spinsters.
´
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Alfred Jarry,
d. 1907
I am dying. Please…bring me a
toothpick.
You may say, the green
depths of l’absinthe
have dissolved the last of
my pataphysical wits––
but stop a moment to
think––perhaps, in the corner
of my only sound tooth,
remains the one wiggly scrap
of truth that I can show the
gatekeeper: one so amazing,
that God must, at last,
apologize for his silly ways.
´
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Dominique
Bouhours, grammarian, d. 1702
I am about to––or I am going
to––die: either expression is correct.
Let it be said, that as I go, I shall go as I have lived,
happy between the lines––correct in all the ways
that seem to matter. The naughty, naughty things
that made my life so sweet will pass the great gate,
unseen under skirts of proper length. But oh
how merrily I will––or shall––wink on the other side.
´
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Eugene O'Neill, d. 1953
I
knew it. I knew it. Born in a hotel room––and God damn it––
died in a hotel
room.
Sic transit gloria
blah-blah-blah––[exit Orestes] in another fleabag,
bathroom down a hall with
wallpaper that whispers failure.
Joe Nightclerk, well-known
theater critic, chuckles behind his cigar.
My hands, twitchy and raw
from re-tying the cords
of bruised lives, lie folded
stiffly on bedsheets
that have known at least a
hundred travelling salesmen.
´
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Leo
Tolstoy, d. 1910
But the peasants––how do the
peasants die?
Do they see the outlines of
paradise
cleared of the mists that
envelop my bed?
As free as I would become, I
lie bound
like Gulliver, trussed by
fame; paralyzed
by philosophies no longer my
own.
O for a simple handshake
with God.
´
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Timothy
Leary, d. 1996
Why
not? Why not? Why not? Yeah.
So many unlocked doors, who’s to say I can’t
open them all, Who’s to say “only the blue one?”
Unimaginable colors inside
me: twirling, chanting.
Yellow into orange into
scarlet into lilac, dancing
down the spectrum, winking
into purple, then wow––
blue––deepest, coolest,
blissed out blue. That’s my door.
´
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Pancho Villa, d. 1923
Don't
let it end like this. Tell them I said something.
As a man of action, fine
talk is not my way.
Find me words that could
ride a horse until it drops;
explode like a train
dynamited from its trestle.
Give me speech sharp as
machetes. I must off
to chew on silence beyond
the dark border,
but for now, tell the crowd
my tongue was like fire.
´
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Marco Polo, d. 1324
I
have not told half of what I saw.
Forget noodles and
fireworks––dare to think
of dragons that swallow
palaces, of magicians
who fly on flaming silks.
Imagine women
so fair that clay armies
march at their behest
across a land so vast that
the sun itself
tires on its day’s journey between borders.
´
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Ethel
Barrymore, d.1959
Is everybody
happy? I want everybody to be
happy. I know I’m happy.
I
want to paint your universe butter-yellow.
Plant
you a garden of daisies and rare radishes.
Have
great chefs bring you a hot meal every day
with
a nice salad. Flowers on the table. And when
your
last call comes, I have arranged to order
three scoops of ice cream
for everyone you love.
´
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Heinich
Heine, d. 1856
God will forgive
me. It is his profession.
I courted
you, You made me a proper European:
many say I have done well at
it. I come before you now
to be lifted, and if you
must, cleansed, for my journey.
Our dealings have always
been agreeable, no reason now,
old friend, to change. Death
need not complicate
our simple business––we both
know just what to do.
´
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Anna Pavlova, d. 1931
Play the last
measure very softly.
Here to carry me offstage,
my swan costume
floats in a twilight new to
me. White, white...
and feathers...I am
flying...every move,
beautiful. I will stay
aloft, and when
the moment is right, alight
to sweet cries
of brava,
brava...the stage to blessed black.
´
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Nostradamus,
d. 1566
Tomorrow, I shall no longer
be here.
Saturn and Mars resplendent in Leo.
The eagle sleeps, cowled at last.
A gray wolf lies with a lamb.
Messages arrive on a strange wind.
The eyes of the seer growed blurred ––
a muddy river now runs clear.
´
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Joan Crawford, d. 1977
Dammit...don't you dare ask God to help me.
I got here on my own,
hoofing and batting my eyes.
Took a new name off the
rack, made it into something.
Fought every inch of the
way––why start crawling now?
So stop trying to get me
into heaven, the only people
I’d possibly know there are
those brats, some agents,
and a bunch of B picture
nobodies in tacky clothes.
´
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Archimedes, d. 212 BC
Don't disturb my circles!
I will drift as a mote of light
between the noble solids of Arcadia .
It is my hour to go––but stay they must.
Men who come to read them will,
in time, unreel their secrets:
the gods smile on perfect numbers.
´
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Jean
Cocteau, d.1963
Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk.
It is
walking towards me, without hurrying.
Exquisite are the aphorisms that twine the gate,
nonchalant are the newel posts and gorgons.
The poplars lining the path are like old uncles.
My death, in livery, advances with a carriage of
straw
led by two matched mares, ethereal and
thoughtful.
He is diffident, but
charming, as I knew he must be.
´
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Lope
de Vega, d. 1635
All right then, I'll say it: Dante makes me sick.
Among those dusty giants in the corner, his flea
circus
of demons and saints still cast shadows in my
chamber––
fantasies far beyond the reach of his talent.
What
could he know of perdition? I’ve bedded hundreds
more women, scourged my flesh with more zeal than
he could ever conjure in his
skinny Florentine mind.
´
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Wilson
Mizner, d.1933
Why should I talk to you? I've just been talking to
your boss.
No offense father, thanks for dropping by
but I have it on the highest
authority––
the Big Guy––that the
fight’s been fixed.
A simple toodle-oo would be
a real waste, so
I arranged a ten-rounder
with old Nick himself,
peddling all the hot tickets
to my enemies.´
´
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Salvador Dalí, d.1989
Where
is my clock?
I need to suckle its hours at the silken breasts
of my Gallician inamorata, ecstatic in her languor.
The key has fallen, the priest has ridden off
on the flaming elephant...the contoursof the horizon
compliment my mustache. I see a velvet swallow lift
the veil––
a dry world of landlocked dolphins beckons.
´
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Kit Carson, d. 1868
I just wish I had time for one more bowl of chili.
You never know, always
soldiering,
off to the next whingding.
Busy––
Navajos,
politicians, Mexican dragoons.
A man needs some time to
sort things out.
Black coffee, a bowl of
cooky’s gunpowder stew,
and a pipe full of thinking
before moving on.
´ •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
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Lewis Carroll, d. 1898
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Take away those pillows. I shall need them no more.
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The looking glass is playing naughty tricks,
I see the girls grow older and they do not
smile.
March Hare sniffs, the party
has wound down.
Snark and Jabberwock fade to
paper. The Queen
commands me to beddy-bye.
Bright Alice, goes.
Dark Alice enters with sweet biscuits and tea.
´
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James
Thurber, d. 1961
God
bless... God damn.
That about
covers it––A to izzard.
No
prolixity for this boy. My aunt
was hell on
grammar. Say it! Mean it!
Nothing more
needed. Life had it’s points,
but as the old
bartender said, “Don’t
let the door hit
you on the way out.”
End
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