Omar Khayyam

I tell you this—When, started from the Goal, Over the flaming shoulders of the Soul Plots the Eternal Saki from his Bowl Ahmad and Mahmud, ere he reach the Goal.

For we are helpless pieces of the game He plays Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days; Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays, And one by one back in the Closet lays.

The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes, But right or left as strikes the Player goes; And He that toss'd you down into the Field, He knows about it all—He knows—He knows!

The Palace that to Heav'n his pillars threw, And Kings the Throne of Jamshyd high o'erthrew, In whose high Courts the crowing Cock might once Have crow'd, but now the Lizard and the Rue.

Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears To-day of past Regrets and future Fears: To-morrow!—Why, To-morrow I may be Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n thousand Years.

Earth, Air, and Water, and the living Fire, And the two Worlds, and all that they desire, Are but the Forms of one—and that one still The shadow of a Shadow, and a Lie.

Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why: Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.

The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop, The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.

The wise men tell us that the soul is not a thing, but a relation. That is true, for the soul is a relation of the body to the universe, and of the universe to the body.

To-day is a king in disguise, and we are his courtiers. To-morrow is a queen, and we are her slaves.

The Potter's Circle, where the pots are made, and broken, and made again, is the symbol of life and death.

The Fire that on my bosom burns, Is not the Fire of Hell; But the Fire of Love, that turns My Soul into a Bell.

The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on.

Drink wine. This is life eternal. This is all that youth will give you. It is the season for wine, roses, and drunken friends.

I sent my soul through the invisible, some letter of that after-life to spell.

Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before I swore – but was I sober when I swore? And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand My impulsive spirit to the wind I threw.

Oh, Thou, who Man of baser Earth didst make, And who with Eden didst devise the Snake; For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man Is blackened – Man’s forgiveness give – and take!

Why, all the Saints and Sages who discussed Of the Two Worlds so learnedly, are thrust Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn Are scattered, and their Mouths are stopped with Dust.

And that inverted Bowl we call the Sky, Whereunder crawling cooped we live and die, Lift not your hands to It for help – for It As impotently moves as you or I.

Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide, And wash the Body whence the Life has died, And in a winding-sheet of Vine-leaf wrapt, So bury me by some sweet Garden-side.