Ecce Homo Complete Works, Volume Seventeen · Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
THE LAST DESIRE[1]
So would I die As then I saw him die, The friend, who like a god Into my darkling youth Threw lightning's light and fire: Buoyant yet deep was he, Yea, in the battle's strife With the gay dancer's heart. Amid the warriors His was the lightest heart, Amid the conquerors His brow was dark with thought-- He was a fate poised on his destiny: Unbending, casting thought into the past And future, such was he. Fearful beneath the weight of victory, Yet chanting, as both victory and death Came hand and hand to him. Commanding even as he lay in death, And his command that man annihilate. So would I die As then I saw him die, Victorious and destroying.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.