From the personal book collection of Mrs. Artin K. Shalian, an old family friend, I pulled out Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam by Edward Fitzgerald and Illustrated by Edmund Dulac. There is no date on the book – but it may have been published around 1909 or so.
I love these old books that offer a message as though there were just yesterday written.
XX Ah, my Beloved, fill the Cup that clears To-day of past Regrets and future fears - To-morrow? - Why, To-morrow I may be Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.
XXVIII With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow, And with my own hand labour'd it to grow; And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd "I came like Water, and like Wind I go."
LXXII Alas, that Spring should vanish with the Rose! That Youth's sweet-secented Manuscript should close! The Nightingale that in the Branches sang, Ah, whence, and whither flown again, who knows!
By Keri Douglas, writer/photographers, Washington, D.C. (Please follow 9 Muses News copyright use policy.)