The Rubaiyat.

I’ve been unconscionably busy today – hence no blog post. Since it’s now way past midnight, I thought I would keep the cogs turning with a bit of homespun wisdom from Omar Khayyam.

‘Come, fill the cup, and in the Fire of Spring
The Winter Garment of Repentance fling:
The bird of time has but a little way
To fly – and Lo! The Bird is on the Wing.’

‘Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse – and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness –
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.’

‘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.’

‘Ah, fill the Cup: - what boots it to repeat
How Time is slipping underneath our feet:
Unborn TOMORROW, and dead YESTERDAY,
Why fret about them if TODAY be sweet!’

And, of course, there is the perennial favourite; the one I heard as a child and never forgot:

‘The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on; nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.’