I am so happy to be here, before this wide, smiling audience, delivering this farewell speech. Over the years it is as if we have become one. All of your eyes have been reflected in mine: likewise, mine in yours. How can we part and yet remain whole?

    It is a beautiful day. The flags over our heads are all wagging and twitching like the tails of excited dogs, I see. Though it is only the action of molecules on molecules I am tempted to invest it with some deeper significance; I am tempted to explore the universe that accompanies the metaphor. I must image the dogs, Elmo and Hutch: Elmo with the bad temper and drooping ear; Hutch with the bad itch that never seems to go away. I wonder about the owners and the hazy world they inhabit beyond the metaphor, beyond the blur of words.

   Sad thoughts will occur to us at a time like this. Thoughts of those who have been with us and are gone; also, peculiarly enough, of those who have never been here at all. That we are here, have been here, is a cause of exultation to my heart. (The left ventricle, in particular, clicks with joy.) I fear, however, for those living in the pataphorical universe. They press their hands against the fogged windows of an imaginary school bus -- a school bus that will never reach its destination, a window that will never be defogged -- attempting for an eternity to peer through to where we sit today, smiling. Their effort is in vain. They, like we, can never see through the fog, the mist, the veil of language. What are we to make of this? Is the pataphorical universe real? And if so, how real? What are we to make of the lost souls there?

    My advice to you today, as I deliver my goodbye, is to live. Do not speculate too earnestly about the universe of the possible. It takes an infinity of forms and leads nowhere. Be concerned instead with the reality of yourselves. Improve your minds and hearts. Leave the world alone and it will take of itself and you. Consider the lilies, not the bees that brush against their nodding heads.

   We have had a spectacular time together. Be consoled that after I am gone I will remain with you, and you with me. Nothing can separate us because we have never been apart at all.

    And so one last time, my friends: Thank you, thank you, thank you.