Omar Khayyam was a 12th-century Persian astronomer, mathematician, and teacher. He wrote many four-line epigrammatic verses, known in Persian as ruba’i, which were later brought together in a collection called the Rubáiyát. In the 1850s English poet and translator Edward FitzGerald reworked Omar’s poetry into rhymed verse and tried to preserve the spirit of the original, if not its precise meaning. FitzGerald published his translation in 1859, but it was not until the second edition appeared in 1868 that the poetry gained immense popularity.
From the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam
1
Wake! For the Sun, who scattered into flight
The Stars before him from the Field of Night,
Drives Night along with them from Heav’n and strikes
The Sultán’s Turret with a Shaft of Light.
2
Before the phantom of False morning died,
Methought a Voice within the Tavern cried,
“When all the Temple is prepared within,
Why nods the drowsy Worshipper outside?”
3
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted—”Open, then, the Door!
You know how little while we have to stay,
And, once departed, may return no more.”
4
Now the New Year reviving old Desires,
The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires.
Where the White Hand of Moses on the Bough
Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires.
5
Iram indeed is gone with all his Rose,
And Jamshyd’s Sev’n-ringed Cup where no one knows;
But still a Ruby kindles in the Vine,
And many a Garden by the Water blows.
6
And David’s lips are locked; but in divine
High—piping Pehleví, with “Wine! Wine! Wine!
Red Wine!”—the Nightingale cries to the Rose
That sallow cheek of hers to incarnadine.
7
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.
8
Whether at Naishápur or Babylon,
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run,
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop,
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.
9
Each Morn a thousand Roses brings, you say;
Yes, but where leaves the Rose of Yesterday?
And this first Summer month that brings the Rose
Shall take Jamshyd and Kaikobád away.
10
Well, let it take them! What have we to do
With Kaikobád the Great, or Kaikhosrú?
Let Zál and Rustum bluster as they will,
Or Hátim call to Supper—heed not you.
11
With me along the strip of Herbage strown
That just divides the desert from the sown,
Where name of Slave and Sultán is forgot—
And Peace to Mahmúd on his golden Throne!
12
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!
13
Some for the Glories of This World; and some
Sigh for the Prophet’s Paradise to come;
Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go,
Nor heed the rumble of a distant Drum!
14
Look to the blowing Rose about us—”Lo,
Laughing,” she says, “into the world I blow,
At once the silken tassel of my Purse
Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.”
15
And those who husbanded the Golden Grain,
And those who flung it to the winds like Rain,
Alike to no such aureate Earth are turned
As, buried once, Men want dug up again.
16
The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon
Turns Ashes—or it prospers; and anon,
Like Snow upon the Desert’s dusty Face,
Lighting a little hour or two—is gone.
17
Think, in this battered Caravanserai
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.
18
They say the Lion and the Lizard keep
The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep;
And Bahrám, that great Hunter—the Wild Ass
Stamps o’er his Head, but cannot break his Sleep.
19
I sometimes think that never blows so red
The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled;
That every Hyacinth the Garden wears
Dropped in her Lap from some once lovely Head.
20
And this reviving Herb whose tender Green
Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean—
Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows
From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen!
21
Ah, my Belovèd, fill the Cup that clears
Today of past Regrets and future Fears:
Tomorrow!—Why, Tomorrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday’s Sev’n thousand Years.
22
For some we loved, the loveliest and the best
That from his Vintage rolling Time hath pressed,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to rest.
23
And we, that now make merry in the Room
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend—ourselves to make a Couch—for whom?
24
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!
25
Alike for those who for Today prepare,
And those that after some Tomorrow stare,
A Muezzín from the Tower of Darkness cries,
“Fools, your Reward is neither Here nor There.”
26
Why, all the Saints and Sages who discussed
Of the Two Worlds so wisely—they are thrust
Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn
Are scattered, and their Mouths are stopped with Dust.
27
Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument
About it and about; but evermore
Came out by the same door where in I went.
28
With them the seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with mine own hand wrought to make it grow;
And this was all the Harvest that I reaped—”I came like Water, and like Wind I go.”
29
Into this Universe, and Why not knowing
Nor Whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing;
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not Whither, willy-nilly blowing.
30
What, without asking, hither hurried Whence?
And, without asking, Whither hurried hence!
Oh, many a Cup of this forbidden Wine
Must drown the memory of that insolence!
31
Up from the Earth’s Centre through the Seventh Gate
I rose, and on the Throne of Saturn sate,
And many a Knot unravelled by the Road;
But not the Master-knot of Human Fate.
32
There was the Door to which I found no Key;
There was the Veil through which I might not see;
Some little talk awhile of ME and THEE
There was—and then no more of Thee and Me.
33
Earth could not answer; nor the Seas that mourn
In flowing Purple, of their Lord forlorn;
Nor rolling Heaven, with all his Signs revealed
And hidden by the sleeve of Night and Morn.
34
Then of the Thee in Me who works behind
The Veil, I lifted up my hands to find
A lamp amid the Darkness; and I heard,
As from Without—”The Me Within Thee Blind!”
35
Then to the Lip of this poor earthen Urn
I leaned, the Secret of my Life to learn;
And Lip to Lip it murmured—”While you live,
Drink!—for, once dead, you never shall return.”
36
I think the Vessel, that with fugitive
Articulation answered, once did live,
And drink; and Ah! the passive Lip I kissed,
How many Kisses might it take—and give!
37
For I remember stopping by the way
To watch a Potter thumping his wet Clay;
And with its all-obliterated Tongue
It murmured—”Gently, Brother, gently, pray!”
38
And has not such a Story from of Old
Down Man’s successive generations rolled
Of such a clod of saturated Earth
Cast by the Maker into Human mould?
39
And not a drop that from our Cups we throw
For Earth to drink of, but may steal below
To quench the fire of Anguish in some Eye
There hidden—far beneath, and long ago.
40
As then the Tulip, for her morning sup
Of Heav’nly Vintage, from the soil looks up,
Do you devoutly do the like, till Heav’n
To Earth invert you—like an empty Cup.
41
Perplexed no more with Human or Divine,
Tomorrow’s tangle to the winds resign,
And lose your fingers in the tresses of
The Cypress-slender Minister of Wine.
42
And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press,
End in what All begins and ends in—Yes;
Think then you are TODAY what YESTERDAY
You were—Tomorrow you shall not be less.
43
So when that Angel of the darker Drink
At last shall find you by the river brink,
And offering his Cup, invite your Soul
Forth to your Lips to quaff—you shall not shrink.
44
Why, if the Soul can fling the Dust aside,
And naked on the Air of Heaven ride,
Were ‘t not a Shame—were ‘t not a Shame for him
In this clay carcass crippled to abide?
45
‘Tis but a Tent where takes his one day’s rest
A Sultán to the realm of Death addressed;
The Sultán rises, and the dark Ferrásh
Strikes, and prepares it for another Guest.
46
And fear not lest Existence closing your
Account, and mine, should know the like no more;
The Eternal Sáki from that Bowl has poured
Millions of Bubbles like us, and will pour.
47
When You and I behind the Veil are past,
Oh, but the long, long while the World shall last,
Which of our Coming and Departure heeds
As the Sea’s self should heed a pebble-cast.
48
A Moment’s Halt—a momentary taste
Of Being from the Well amid the Waste—
And Lo!—the phantom Caravan has reached
The Nothing it set out from—Oh, make haste!
49
Would you that spangle of Existence spend
About The Secret—quick about it, Friend!
A Hair perhaps divides the False and True—
And upon what, prithee, may life depend?
50
A Hair perhaps divides the False and True—
Yes; and a single Alif were the clue—
Could you but find it—to the Treasure-house,
And peradventure to The Master too;
51
Whose secret Presence, through Creation’s veins
Running Quicksilver-like, eludes your pains;
Taking all shapes from Máh to Máhi; and
They change and perish all—but He remains;
52
A moment guessed—then back behind the Fold
Immersed of Darkness round the Drama rolled
Which, for the Pastime of Eternity,
He doth Himself contrive, enact, behold.
53
But if in vain, down on the stubborn floor
Of Earth, and up to Heav’n’s unopening Door,
You gaze Today, while You are You—how then
Tomorrow, You when shall be You no more?
54
Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit
Of This and That endeavour and dispute;
Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit.
55
You know, my Friends, with what a brave Carouse
I made a Second Marriage in my house;
Divorced old barren Reason from my Bed,
And took the Daughter of the Vine to Spouse.
56
For “Is” and “Is-not” though with Rule and Line,
And “Up-and-down” by Logic, I define,
Of all that one should care to fathom, I
Was never deep in anything but—Wine.
57
Ah, but my Computations, People say,
Reduced the Year to better reckoning?—Nay,
‘Twas only striking from the Calendar
Unborn Tomorrow, and dead Yesterday.
58
And lately, by the Tavern Door agape,
Came shining through the Dusk an Angel Shape
Bearing a Vessel on his Shoulder; and
He bid me taste of it; and ‘twas—the Grape!
59
The Grape that can with Logic absolute
The Two-and-Seventy jarring Sects confute;
The sovereign Alchemist that in a trice
Life’s leaden metal into Gold transmute;
60
The mighty Mahmúd, Allah-breathing Lord,
That all the misbelieving and black Horde
Of Fears and Sorrows that infest the Soul
Scatters before him with his whirlwind Sword.
61
Why, be this Juice the growth of God, who dare
Blaspheme the twisted tendril as a Snare?
A Blessing, we should use it, should we not?
And if a Curse—why, then, Who set it there?
62
I must abjure the Balm of Life, I must,
Scared by some After-reckoning ta’en on trust
Or lured with Hope of some Diviner Drink,
To fill the Cup—when crumbled into Dust!
63
Oh threats of Hell and Hopes of Paradise!
One thing at least is certain—This Life flies;
One thing is certain and the rest is Lies—
The Flower that once has blown forever dies.
64
Strange, is it not? that of the myriads who
Before us passed the door of Darkness through,
Not one returns to tell us of the Road,
Which to discover we must travel too.
65
The Revelations of Devout and Learn’d
Who rose before us, and as Prophets burned,
Are all but Stories, which, awoke from Sleep,
They told their comrades, and to Sleep returned.
66
I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
Some letter of that After-life to spell;
And by and by my Soul returned to me,
And answered, “I Myself am Heav’n and Hell”—
67
Heaven but the Vision of fulfilled Desire,
And Hell the Shadow from a Soul on fire
Cast on the Darkness into which Ourselves,
So late emerged from, shall so soon expire.
68
We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In Midnight by the Master of the Show;
69
But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays
Upon this Chequerboard of Nights and Days;
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
70
The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes,
But Here or There as strikes the Player goes;
And He that tossed you down into the Field,
He knows about it all—he knows—he knows!
71
The Moving Finger writes, and, having writ,
Moves on; nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
72
And that inverted Bowl they 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.
73
With Earth’s first Clay They did the Last Man knead,
And there of the Last Harvest sowed the Seed;
And the first Morning of Creation wrote
What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read.
74
YesterdayThis Day’s Madness did prepare;
Tomorrow’S Silence, Triumph, or Despair.
Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why;
Drink, for you know not why you go, nor where.
75
I tell you this—When, started from the Goal,
Over the flaming shoulders of the Foal
Of Heav’n Parwín and Mushtarí they flung,
In my predestined Plot of Dust and Soul
76
The Vine had struck a fibre; which about
If clings my Being—let the Dervish flout;
Of my Base metal may be filed a Key,
That shall unlock the Door he howls without.
77
And this I know: whether the one True Light
Kindle to Love, or Wrath—consume me quite,
One Flash of It within the Tavern caught
Better than in the Temple lost outright.
78
What! out of senseless Nothing to provoke
A conscious Something to resent the yoke
Of unpermitted Pleasure, under pain
Of Everlasting Penalties, if broke!
79
What! from his helpless Creature be repaid
Pure Gold for what he lent him dross-allayed—
Sue for a Debt he never did contract,
And cannot answer—Oh, the sorry trade!
80
O Thou, who didst with pitfall and with gin
Beset the Road I was to wander in,
Thou wilt not with Predestined Evil round
Enmesh, and then impute my Fall to Sin!
81
O Thou, who Man of Baser Earth didst make,
And ev’n with Paradise devise the Snake,
For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man
Is blackened—Man’s forgiveness give—and take!
82
As under cover of departing Day
Slunk hunger-stricken Ramazán away,
Once more within the Potter’s house alone
I stood, surrounded by the Shapes of Clay—
83
Shapes of all Sorts and Sizes, great and small
That stood along the floor and by the wall;
And some loquacious Vessels were; and some
Listened perhaps, but never talked at all.
84
Said one among them—”Surely not in vain
My substance of the common Earth was ta’en
And to this Figure moulded, to be broke,
Or trampled back to shapeless Earth again.”
85
Then said a Second—”Ne’er a peevish Boy
Would break the Bowl from which he drank in joy;
And He that with his hand the Vessel made
Will surely not in after Wrath destroy.”
86
After a momentary silence spake
Some Vessel of a more ungainly Make:
“They sneer at me for leaning all awry;
What! did the Hand, then, of the Potter shake?”
87
Whereat someone of the loquacious Lot—
I think a Súfi pipkin—waxing hot—”All this of Pot and Potter—Tell me then,
Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot?”
88
“Why,” said another, “Some there are who tell
Of one who threatens he will toss to Hell
The luckless Pots he marred in making—Pish!
He’s a Good Fellow, and ‘twill all be well.”
89
“Well,” murmured one, “Let whoso make or buy,
My Clay with long Oblivion is gone dry;
But fill me with the old familiar Juice,
Methinks I might recover by and by.”
90
So while the Vessels one by one were speaking
The little Moon looked in that all were seeking;
And then they jogged each other, “Brother! Brother!
Now for the Porter’s shoulder-knot a-creaking!”
91
Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide,
And wash the Body whence the Life has died,
And lay me, shrouded in the living Leaf,
By some not unfrequented Garden-side—
92
That ev’n my buried Ashes such a snare
Of Vintage shall fling up into the Air
As not a True-believer passing by
But shall be overtaken unaware.
93
Indeed the Idols I have loved so long
Have done my credit in this World much wrong,
Have drowned my Glory in a shallow Cup,
And sold my Reputation for a Song.
94
lndeed, indeed, Repentance oft before
I swore—but was I sober when I swore?
And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand
My threadbare Penitence apieces tore.
95
And much as Wine has played the Infidel,
And robbed me of my Robe of Honour—Well,
I wonder often what the Vintners buy
One-half so precious as the stuff they sell.
96
Yet Ah, that Spring should vanish with the Rose!
That Youth’s sweet-scented manuscript should close!
The Nightingale that in the branches sang,
Ah whence, and whither flown again, who knows!
97
Would but the Desert of the Fountain yield
One glimpse—if dimly, yet indeed, revealed,
To which the fainting Traveller might spring,
As springs the trampled herbage of the field.
98
Would but some wingèd Angel ere too late
Arrest the yet unfolded Roll of Fate,
And make the stern Recorder otherwise
Enregister, or quite obliterate!
99
Ah, Love! could you and I with Him conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits—and then
Remould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire!
100
Yon rising Moon that looks for us again—
How oft hereafter will she wax and wane;
How oft hereafter rising look for us
Through this same Garden—and for one in vain!
101
And when like her, O Sákí, you shall pass
Among the Guests Star-scattered on the Grass,
And in your joyous errand reach the spot
Where I made One—turn down an empty Glass!
Microsoft ® Encarta ® Reference Library 2005. © 1993-2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
