Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. 1922.
From Omar KhayyámEdward Fitzgerald (18091883)
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
O, Wilderness were Paradise enow!
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!
Laughing,’ she says, ‘into the world I blow,
At once the silken tassel of my Purse
Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw.’
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.
Whose Portals are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultán after Sultán with his Pomp
Abode his destined Hour, and went his way.
The Courts where Jamshyd gloried and drank deep:
And Bahram, that great Hunter—the wild Ass
Stamps o’er his Head, but cannot break his sleep.
The Rose as where some buried Caesar bled;
That every Hyacinth the Garden wears
Dropt in her Lap from some once lovely Head.
Fledges the River-Lip on which we lean—
Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows
From what once lovely Lip it springs unseen!
T
To-morrow!—Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday’s Sev’n thousand Years.
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.
They left, and Summer dresses in new bloom,
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend—ourselves to make a Couch—for whom?
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust unto dust, and under Dust to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and—sans End!
And wash my Body whence the Life has died,
And lay me, shrouded in the living Leaf,
By some not unfrequented Garden-side!…
How oft hereafter will she wax and wane;
How oft hereafter rising look for us
Through this same Garden—and for one in vain!
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!