Life - Wisdom - Omar Khayyám

Omar Khayyám

18 May 1048 – 4 December 1131

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.

But helpless pieces in the game He plays,
 Upon this chequer-board of Nights and Days,
He hither and thither moves, and checks… and slays,
 Then one by one, back in the Closet lays.

And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
 The Tavern shouted— “Open then the Door!
You know how little time we have to stay,
 And once departed, may return no more.”

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
 A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou,
Beside me singing in the Wilderness,
 And oh, Wilderness is Paradise enow.

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
 Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument
About it and about: but evermore
 Came out of the same Door as in I went.

With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,
 And with my own hand labour’d it to grow:
And this was all the Harvest that I reap’d—
 “I came like Water, and like Wind I go.”

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.

And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky,
 Whereunder crawling coop’t we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to It for help—for It
 Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.

I sent my Soul through the Invisible,
 Some letter of that After-life to spell:
And by and by my Soul return'd to me,
 And answer'd "I Myself am Heav'n and Hell:"