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Sail out for good? for aye, O mystic yacht!

About This Item

  • Title: Sail out for good? for aye, O mystic yacht!
  • Date: 1890 or 1891
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: bos.00003
  • Source: From the The Alice and Rollo G. Silver Collection in the Special Collections at Boston University. Transcribed from digital images of the original. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the manuscripts, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Editorial note: This manuscript is a draft of "Sail Out for Good, Eidólon Yacht!," which was published first in Lippincott's Magazine in March, 1891, with "Sounds of the Winter," "The Unexpress'd," and "After the Argument" under the general title of "Old-Age Echoes." Whitman probably composed this manuscript shortly before the poem's publication.
  • Related Item(s):
    • The back of the manuscript leaf is an opened envelope, postmarked June 1890, glued to another scrap. See bos.00021.
    • See wwa.00173.
  • Notes written on manuscript: On leaf 1 verso, in unknown hand: "Good bye My Fancy | Sail out for Good Etc | Page 7—Good Bye My Fancy"
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Sail out for good? for aye, O mystic yacht!." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 18 April 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: bos.00003.xml (TEI)

Key

Textual Feature Appearance
Overwritten brown with strikethrough
Added inline purple with double underline
Uncertain gray with wavy underline
Supplied from another source turquoise with brackets
Metamark green with triple underline
Long deletion gray background with top and bottom border
  [begin leaf 1 recto] ntx

Sail forth out for good ? for aye, ? O mystic yacht! of me

Heave the anchor short, Raise main-sail and jib—steer out forth, ? for aye O little white-hull'd sloop,—now for the truly to ? speed take me truly really  
 on to deep waters Now, now to thy divinest venture (I will not call it my our concluding voyage, [illegible] But outset and sure entrance to the truest,  
 best, maturest,) In perfect faith—Depart ^for good!! ^depart ^from ? solid earth——no more returning  
 to these shores, Now, ^henceforth starting on now, for good, upon thy our great divinest ? infinite  
 venture sail! sailing, starting, Spurning all yet known ports, seas, grav-  
 itation Sail forth out, in perfect faith ^for good for aye O mystic yacht of me.   [begin leaf 1 verso] Good bye My Fancy | Sail out for Good Etc | Page 7—Good Bye My Fancy
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