Rubaiyat Of Summer Khayyam

RUBAIYAT OF SUMMER KHAYYAM
3771

WAKE! For the Summer scatters into flight
Your wife before you to some Country site;
She’ll take the children with her, and she’ll leave
The Parlor Fumiture done up in white

The Cook indeed is gone The Waitress goes
To-morrow Their Returning no one knows
But still there are cafes where one may dine,
And some Roof Gardens have attrattive Shows

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we, too, down to the Shore must wend:
Cramped in small rooms, fed on distressing food,
Sans wine, sans song, sans dinner and sans friend

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Summer Hotels, and gladly paid the rent,
Nor grumbled at the Bill; but now I know ‘
Twas Money most egregiously misspent

Waste not your hour in silly, capid
Talk Meandering up and down the long
Board Walle Better be jocund with a
Friend or two On Summer Nights in Little Old New York

And that Inverted Box they call your room,
Whereunder crawling, cooped, you live in gloom
Lift not your hands at it, for it is not More
Dark or Small than any other Tomb

Yesterday’s Roast this Breakfast did prepare,
To-morrow’s Soup or Ragout still is there;
Eat, for you know not whence it came or why,
Eat, for you know not when you go or where

The Bill no question makes of Ayes or
Noes: It’s high or low, as your Appearance goes
And he behind the Desk, who makes it out,-
He knows how much you’re worth, he knows, he knows I

The smiling clerk just writes, and, having writ,
It’s due Nor all your
Bluster nor your Grit
Shall lure him back to cancel a Mistake,
Nor all your Rage mark off a charge of it

Indeed I vowed I’d Never go there more;
I swore, but was I sober when I swore?
And then my Wife wrote up, and I went down,
Exactly as I went the week before

Would but some winged Angel, ere too late,
Arrest the yet unfolded Roll of Fate,
And all those Summer Hotels by the Sea
Wipe out, Expunge and quite obliterate

Ah, Love, could you and I but have our say,
About this sorry scheme of Summers gay;
We’d shatter it to little bits and then
Re-mould it nearer to Dear Old Broadway