RUBAYAT
Oh, wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law, to another bound;
Created sick, commanded to be sound.
We that are bound by vows and promotion
With pomp of holy sacrifices and rites
To teach belief in good and devotion
To preach of Heaven’s wonders and delights.
And do you think that such as you
A maggot minded, starved, fanatic few
God gave a secret and denied it to me?
Well, what matters it? Let them believe it too!
Yet when each of us in his own heart looks,
He finds the God there far unlike his books.
The moving finger writes, and having writ, moves on;
Nor all they Piety, nor Wit,
Can lure it back to cancel half a line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a word of it.
And that inverted bowl we call the Sky
Where under crawling cooped we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to it for help,
For it rolls impotently on as Thou or I.
Lyrics: Ghiyath ad-Din Abu’l-Fat Umar ibn Ibrahim al-Khayyam Nishapuri (May 18, 1048 – December 4, 1131)
Book: Rubaiyats of Omar Khayyam [excerpts]
Translation: Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke, de jure 13th Baron Latimer, 5th Baron Willoughby de Broke (October 3, 1554 – September 30, 1628)