The Sufistic Quatrains Of Omar Khayyam Part 56

I served a long apprenticeship to fate, But yet of fortune gained no mastery.

346. C. L. N. A. I. J. _Ek dam zadan_, For one moment.

347.

One hand with Koran, one with wine-cup dight, I half incline to wrong, and half to right; The azure-marbled sky looks down on me A sorry Moslem, yet not heathen quite.

347. C. L. N. A. I. J. Khayyam here describes himself as _akrates_ rather than _akolastos_, _Video meliora proboque_, etc.

348.

Khayyam's respects to Mustafa convey, And with due reverence ask him to say, Why it has pleased him to forbid pure wine, When he allows his people acid whey?

348 and 349. L. These two quatrains are also found in Whalley's Morababad edition. _Mustafa_, _i.e._, Muhammad. So Avicenna. See Renan, Averroes, 171.

349.

Tell Khayyam, for a master of the schools, He strangely misinterprets my plain rules: Where have I said that wine is wrong for all?

'Tis lawful for the wise, but not for fools.

350.

My critics call me a philosopher, But Allah knows full well they greatly err; I know not even what I am, much less Why on this earth I am a sojourner!

350. C. L. A. I. J. Filsafat meant the Greek philosophy as cultivated by Persian rationalists, in opposition to theology. Renan, Averroes, p. 91.

351.

The more I die to self, I live the more, The more abase myself, the higher soar; And, strange! the more I drink of Being's wine, More sane I grow and sober than before.

351. L. Clearly Mystical.

352.

Quoth rose, I am the Yusuf flower, I swear, For in my mouth rich golden gems I bear: I said, Show me another proof. Quoth she, Behold this blood-stained vesture that I wear!

352. B. L. Yusuf is the type of manly beauty. The yellow stamens are compared to his teeth. So Jami, in _Yusuf wa Zulaikha_.

353.

I studied with the masters long ago, And long ago did master all they know; Here now the end and issue of it all, From earth I came, and like the wind I go!

353. L. B. Mr. Fitzgerald compares the dying exclamation of Nizam ul-Mulk, I am going in the hands of the wind! _Mantik ut Tair_, 1.

4620.

354.

Death finds us soiled, though we were pure at birth, With grief we go, although we came with mirth; Watered with tears, and burned with fires of woe, And, casting life to winds, we rest in earth!

354. C. L. A. I. J.

355.

To find great Jamshid's world-reflecting bowl I compa.s.sed sea and land, and viewed the whole; But, when I asked the wary sage, I learned That bowl was my own body, and my soul!

355. L. King Jamshid's cup, which reflected the whole world, is the Holy Grail of Persian poetry. Meaning man is the microcosm. See note on No.

340. In line 2 scan _naghnudem_.

356.

Me, cruel Queen! you love to captivate, And from a knight to a poor p.a.w.n translate, You marshal all your force to tire me out, You take my rooks with yours, and then checkmate!

356. C. L. A. I. J. The pun on _rukh_, cheek, and _rukh_, castle, is untranslatable.

357.

If Allah wills me not to will aright, How can I frame my will to will aright?

Each single act I will must needs be wrong, Since none but He has power to will aright.

357. C. L. A. I. J.

358.

For once, while roses are in bloom, I said, I'll break the law, and please myself instead, With blooming youths, and maidens' tulip cheeks The plain shall blossom like a tulip-bed.

358. L. N. _Rozi_, _ya i batni_, or _tankir_ (?).

359.

Think not I am existent of myself, Or walk this blood-stained pathway of myself; This being is not I, it is of Him.

Pray what, and where, and whence is this myself?

359. C. L. A. I. J. In line 3 I omit _wa_ after _Lu bud_. Meaning, Man's real existence is not of himself, but of the Truth, the universal _Noumenon_.

360.