Cassio Hears Othello

Thus for the last last time with the first kiss! O my white bird, here is the precipice! I throw you like a homing carrier Into the footless spaces of the air! And your spread wings, set free, beat up and out In mounting circles, storming death’s redoubt And the cloudy fortress of Avilion. Gone, my white bird, beyond all dreaming, gone! And my hands warm that held her. Cassio It was well done! Always to let her go In the grave they shall be open thus, and yet Feeling the half-poised wings—poor hands! Forget My madness, Cassio, and think of me As of a man who set his sea-bird free From the prison of his heart to see her win The deep blue floors of heaven and enter in. O I am glad, I am glad, I dared this thing. Even now my bird is home, awakening Among her shining sisters, far—so far, Not even the thoughts I have can trouble her. So carve upon the stone that marks my grave: “All that he had to death Othello gave, And has kept nothing back but the sweet wound Of life, that grew so dear, because he found The mortal knife, that stabbed him, slit the strings That gave his bird the guerdon of her wings.”