That yellow Cheek of hers to’incarnadine.

Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring

The Winter Garment of Repentance fling:

   The Bird of Time has but a little way

To fly—and Lo! the Bird is on the Wing.

And look—a thousand Blossoms with the Day

Woke—and a thousand scatter’d into Clay:

   And this first Summer Month that brings the Rose

Shall take Jamshýd and Kaikobád away.

But come with old Khayyám, and leave the Lot

Of Kaikobád and Kaikhosrú forgot:

   Let Rustum lay about him as he will,

Or Hátim Tai cry Supper—heed them not.

With me along some Strip of Herbage strown

That just divides the desert from the sown,

   Where name of Slave and Sultán scarce is known,

And pity Sultán Máhmúd on his Throne.

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,

A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse—and Thou

   Beside me singing in the Wilderness—

And Wilderness is Paradise enow.

“How sweet is mortal Sovranty!”—think some:

Others—“How blest the Paradise to come!”

   Ah,