Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed. 1919. The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900.
Edward Fitzgerald. 18091883698. From Omar Khayyám
A BOOK of Verses underneath the Bough, | |
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou | |
Beside me singing in the Wilderness— | |
O, Wilderness were Paradise enow! | |
Some for the Glories of This World; and some | 5 |
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! | |
Look to the blowing Rose about us—’Lo, | |
Laughing,’ she says, ‘into the world I blow, | 10 |
At once the silken tassel of my Purse | |
Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.’ | |
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 | 15 |
As, buried once, Men want dug up again. | |
Think, in this batter’d Caravanserai | |
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day, | |
How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp | |
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way. | 20 |
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. | |
I sometimes think that never blows so red | 25 |
The Rose as where some buried Cæsar bled; | |
That every Hyacinth the Garden wears | |
Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head. | |
And this reviving Herb whose tender Green | |
Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean— | 30 |
Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows | |
From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen! | |
Ah, my Belovèd, fill the Cup that clears | |
TO-DAY of past Regrets and Future Fears: | |
To-morrow!—Why, To-morrow I may be | 35 |
Myself with Yesterday’s Sev’n thousand Years. | |
For some we loved, the loveliest and the best | |
That from his Vintage rolling Time hath prest, | |
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before, | |
And one by one crept silently to rest. | 40 |
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? | |
Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, | 45 |
Before we too into the Dust descend; | |
Dust unto Dust, and under Dust to lie, | |
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and—sans End! | |
Ah, with the Grape my fading Life provide, | |
And wash my Body whence the Life has died, | 50 |
And lay me, shrouded in the living Leaf, | |
By some not unfrequented Garden-side…. | |
Yon rising Moon that looks for us again— | |
How oft hereafter will she wax and wane; | |
How oft hereafter rising look or us | 55 |
Through this same Garden—and for one in vain! | |
And when like her O Sákí, you shall pass | |
Among the Guests star-scatter’d on the Grass, | |
And in your joyous errand reach the spot | |
Where I made One—turn down an empty Glass! | 60 |