AFTER THE RUBAIYAT

 
 
                               I
 
Oh, who can equal Omar's grand display
Or match the music of Fitzgerald's lay?
I but admire the muse that led them, and
Choose for myself another nearby way...
 
                               II
 
I sat a spell with Omar in his tent,
But, having left the way that in I went,
I next went to another known as Ron
And this time came away less innocent.
 
                               III
 
There was a door, he handed me the key;
There was a veil, he showed me how to see.
Some little talk awhile of thee to me
There was, and then some talk of me to thee.
 
                               IV
 
With Ron I walked the seven-gated road,
The path of yesterday's long years bestrode,
And as we went, the darkness of the past
He showed me, and tomorrow's bright abode.

                                V
 
I looked upon the past that's been my lot,
Recalling things I once thought well forgot
And by and by I slowly came to see
That nothing done was ever done for naught.
 
                               VI
 
For me the world the face of science wore
Until I learned it was a mask, no more.
Now I have looked behind the mask and found
A truth I had forgotten long before.
 
                               VII
 
Into this universe and why full knowing
I came, but soon became like water flowing
As doubts blew in like wind upon the waste
And sent my knowing willy-nilly blowing.
 
                               VIII
 
It well may be that never blows so red
The rose as where some buried Caesar bled,
But only if poor Caesar thinks himself
To be the blood that pulsed within his head.
 
                               IX
 
The life that brings the rose anew each spring
As well for me a new abode will bring;
The shapes of clay may come and go with time
But we who habit them do not, we cling.

                               X
 
For every flower that, blown, forever dies,
Another flower opens to the skies.
The essence that creates the flower lives on;
Who will not know this truth must live with lies.
 
                               XI
 
Fashioned from dust and unto dust returned;
Beyond all else, one thing at least I've learned:
Bodies alone are dust, and take their shapes
Only as each undying soul has yearned.
 
                               XII
 
It's true that man's abode on earth is dust,
And wet it with the wine of life he must
For man the vintner makes the wine himself,
And having made it, keeps it, as a trust.
 
                               XIII
 
What world made Omar wrong for drinking wine?                     
Was it unlike the one where I drink mine?
He drank the wine of life, as do we all;
Such wine is sacred, and to drink divine.

 
                               XIV
 
This cup is my creation, so the wine;
The cup from the same clay where grows the vine
I mold to make a vessel from which I
May drink the wine you pour, as you drink mine.

 

                               XV
 
The maker of each pot therein resides,
As if from shame at his creation, hides
And seeks a Maker somewhere else without
To succor him, and wear his guilt besides.
 
                               XVI
 
Where is the God who shaped us all from clay?
Who put us here?  Who bid that we should stay?
These questions ask, but ask as well, if we
Were here unbidden would we rather stray?
 
                               XVII
 
My lives I make as vintners make their wine,
Each vintage takes its own unique design
And as we vintners work our common press
I'll try a sip of yours, and you'll taste mine.
 
                               XVIII
 
A man can only do what comes his way
And shape his life from his allotted clay,
But shape it well, because the shape's the thing
That in the end tells what we've had to say.