Omar Khayyam

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,

A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread — and Thou

Beside me singing in the Wilderness —

Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,

Before we too into the Dust Descend;

Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie,

Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer and — sans End!

"How sweet is mortal Sovranty!"—think some:

Others — "How blest the Paradise to come!"

Ah, take the Cash in hand and wave the Rest;

Oh, the brave Music of a distant Drum!

They say the Lion and the Lizard keep

The Courts where Jamshýd gloried and drank deep:

And Bahrám, that great Hunter—the Wild Ass

Stamps o'er his Head, and he lies fast asleep.

Ah! my Belovéd, 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.

I sometimes think that never blows so red

The Rose as where some buried Cæsar bled;

That every Hyacinth the Garden wears

Dropt in its Lap from some once lovely Head.

Each Morn a thousand Roses brings, you say;

Yes, but where leaves the Rose of Yesterday?

And those who husbanded the Golden Grain,

And those who flung it to the Winds like Rain,

Alike to no such aureate Earth are turn'd

As, buried once, Men want dug up again.

Come, fill the Cup, and in the fire of Spring

Your Winter-garment of Repentance fling:

The Bird of Time has but a little way

To flutter — and the Bird is on the Wing.

Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai

Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,

How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp

Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.

Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and the best

That Time and Fate of all their Vintage prest,

Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,

And one by one crept silently to Rest.

Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky

I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry,

"Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup

Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."