On Reading Omar Khayyam

In the midst of the battle I turned,

( For the thunders could flourish without me )

And hid by a rose-hung wall,

Forgetting the murder about me;

And wrote, from my wound, on the stone,

In mirth, half prayer, half play:—

“Send me a picture book,

Send me a song, to-day.”

I saw him there by the wall

When I scarce had written the line,

In the enemy's colors dressed

And the serpent-standard of wine

Writhing its withered length

From his ghostly hands o'er the ground,

And there by his shadowy breast

The glorious poem I found.

This was his world-old cry:

Thus read the famous prayer:

“Wine, wine, wine and flowers

And cup-bearers always fair!”

‘ Twas a book of the snares of earth

Bordered in gold and blue,

And I read each line to the wind

And read to the roses too:

And they nodded their womanly heads

And told to the wall just why

For wine of the earth men bleed,

Kingdoms and empires die.

I envied the grape stained sage:

( The roses were praising him. )

The ways of the world seemed good

And the glory of heaven dim.

I envied the endless kings

Who found great pearls in the mire,

Who bought with the nation's life

The cup of delicious fire.

But the wine of God came down,

And I drank it out of the air.

( Fair is the serpent-cup,

But the cup of God more fair. )

The wine of God came down

That makes no drinker to weep.

And I went back to battle again

Leaving the singer asleep.