The New Rubaiyat: Modern Affirmations and Aspirations
By Austin P. Torney
Copyright 2012 Austin P. Torney
Smashwords Edition
< 0 >
— The Poetic Form —
The verses beat the same, in measured chime;
Lines one-two set the stage, one-two-four rhyme.
Verse three’s the pivot around which thought turns;
Line four delivers the sting, just in time.
< 1 >
— Whens —
Life is a web, of whos, whys, whats, and hows,
Stretched in time between eternal boughs.
Gossamer threads hold the beads that glisten,
Each minute a sequence of instant nows.
< 2 >
— A Question of Life or Death —
Since death is a certain fate on the Earth,
One might ask: How shall I live my worth?
Stay busy living, or you’ll be dying.
The answer please. There’s life after birth!
< 3 >
— Distant Promise —
To future columns, we stretch our present row,
By a lifeline of tenuously spun vow.
Oh, how soon the weighted web begins to fail;
The only real time under our feet is now.
< 4 >
— Pity the Poor Sultan —
Where the river runs, far from Sultan’s throne,
We live by the stream-side, just us alone.
Here we’ve the perfect equilibrium:
Poor but rich, home yet free, great but unknown.
< 5 >
— Thought Experiment —
Hence old or sick, one might regret or pine,
Giving all to have back some better time.
Now you are young and fine, so, be glad, smile;
Ne’er again will you live this life of thine.
< 6 >
— The Fluttering Songbird of Youth —
The child in us is warm, playful, and bold,
But vanishes, ere we know, leaving us cold.
Now this we know: The day we stop being
Playful is the day we start to get old.
< 7 >
— Self-Less —
When younger, I know not my elder same,
But, as older, I tell my younger same
That youth must be young; he knows not my name!
It is my younger self that is to blame.
< 8 >
— Queen for a Day —
A rose’s prime lasts for but an hour of morn,
Flowering and free, then fragile and forlorn.
The petals float to earth, and there signify
That beauty’s past, for all that’s left is the thorn.
< 9 >
— About Time —
But now, we retrieve the wingéd hours,
Those that drudges steal and overpower,
Hours gentle and mild, like cleansing showers,
That fill the cup and freshen the flowers.
< 10 >
— The Facts of Life —
Fresh winds make love to the blossoms of May,
As spring flowers reach for the light of day,
Drinking deep droughts of life’s sunny delight.
Meadows burst with the joy of love’s bouquet.
< 11 >
— For-Rest —
With her I stroll the wooded scene,
Beholding forest wonders seldom seen;
The leaves breathe deep, of the wandering airs,
With the growth of spring thrust upon them green.
< 12 >
— In the Wilderness —
She is sweet, soft, and inconsummably wild,
As she lies beside me, like a sleeping child.
Her quiet breathing stirs not the wooded scene,
As she rests silently on the forest green.
< 13 >
— Wine, Bread, and Thou —
I caress her tresses, in romantic rhythm,
To the contented sighs she sends toward Heaven.
We slumber where the grass fledges the stream,
Half-awake or asleep, in love’s peaceful dream.
< 14 >
— Under the Bough —
Above us, the branches slowly sway, and fan
Away the little creatures that try to land.
The trickling waters play tinkling lullabies,
While flocks of returning geese fly the skies.
< 15 >
— Signs of Life —
Throughout the day we sit beside a brook,
Reading with life its most wonderful book,
Then sleep with each other, in a sweet nook,
And this of her and me was all it took.
< 16 >
— Seeing Us —
A fish swims in the reflected sky;
Sunset’s image burns the water dry.
I look in the pond, but see her face,
For we have merged in love, she and I.
< 17 >
— Resonance —
Kissing on the rocks, by the riverside,
Our rhythm ripples water, raises the tide,
Rings ship’s bells, dances light cross sea and sky,
All vibrations live, from hearts satisfied.
< 18 >
— At-one-ment —
For my sins of spring I repent my part;
No! I mustn’t repent, for how, apart,
Could I resist the beauty of love’s truth,
When roses and tulips bloom in loving hearts?
< 19 >
— Intellectual Beauty —
The well-spring calls, the weary traveler rests,
As from a torrent, when, riding waves and crests,
S/he looks, in depth, to find a deeper source,
And ‘hears’ by inner sense against it pressed.
< 20 >
— Fountain of Light —
Soul to soul, it says to one, I’m the light,
Thy spirit’s sight, a beauty bold and bright,
An inspiration come from darkest night,
A newborn star aglow with insight.
< 21 >
— Tantric Exercise —
Look at the stars in the depths of the night;
Hold their flames in your mind, keeping them bright.
Their power flows, energizing you, from
The Eternal Charger; you see the light!
< 22 >
— Thought-Full —
Insight stabs the utter darkness of nought,
As ideas that wink in the mind as thought.
This is the only knowledge to be known;
All else is aforethought or afterthought.
< 23 >
— Sci-fi —
Among the lights that dance in the sky,
A haven waits out there for you and I,
A world where flowers bloom and fountains spray,
A paradise called Earth to glorify.
< 24 >
— We are the Cosmos —
Life’s a continual cosmic energy dance,
From some ultimate underlying happenstance.
We’re immersed in matter’s universal rhythm;
Therefore, we must all participate in the dance.
< 25 >
— Coffee Invented —
Coffee plants are in the desert first seen,
By a starving outcast, who eats the bean,
And finds it bitter; so, he boils some, tart,
Finding that the water is the better part.
< 26 >
— Coffee Resented —
Such, from asylum, he returns home, quaint,
And for his coffee is declared a saint,
Though its drinkers are despised by clerics;
The partakers dally over their cups!
< 27 >
— Unheard From —
Don’t let life’s noise bother you, day and night.
Find some secret place, far from the spotlight,
Where silence can’t be drowned, where you can hear
The voice of your inner chorus singing outright.
< 28 >
— Sanctifier —
The soul to solitude does oft retire
When the noise of life sets the nerves on fire.
There the rhythmic songs of nature inspire;
We sense the vibrance of the inner choir.
< 29 >
— Best Friend —
Dear solitude, who with silence does blend
Quietly, to let all my thoughts ascend:
With you I’m alone but never lonely,
For I am my own best and loving friend.
< 30 >
— Recipe —
Sunbeams, breezes, dewdrops everywhere,
Nature, love, friends, sensation, adventure;
We have it all; four elements are there:
Life’s a mix of earth, fire, water, and air.
< 31 >
— Grateful Prayer —
Our blood runs warm with the sun’s heat at noon;
The spirit is swept by the swelling moon;
Air surrounds us; The ocean flows through us.
Earth’s rhythm is always playing our tune.
< 32 >
— Balance —
Not quite sober blessed nor drunk to excess;
Never too foolish nor very reckless;
Ah, one’s passion is so reasonable
In this delicate state of awareness.
< 33 >
— The Union Begets All —
There’s a subtle, interlinked complexity of
Life, a relation that unites the world in love:
The earth is our mother, sustaining from below;
The sky is our father, nourishing from above.
< 34 >
— A Word’s Girth —
I notice here, a great pittance and dearth
Of words that rhyme with our beloved Earth;
So, aside from mirth, how can poems give birth
To all that life on this planet is worth?
< 35 >
— Sum of the Parts —
Life must be more like a mosaic done,
Than a focused laser tunnel of sun.
Since few lengthy pleasures are lent to us,
We must build stained-glass windows of small ones.
< 36 >
— Living on the Edge —
We dare to walk the line, balancing fun
There, between adventure and misfortune,
For the greatest blunder in life is to
Repeatedly fear that we might make one.
< 37 >
— Byron’s Golden Mean —
Let us have wine, lovers, song, and laughter,
Water, chastity, prayer the day after.
Such we’ll alternate the rest of our days;
On the average, we’ll make Hereafter!
< 38 >
— Wholeness —
Classicists drone toward dull perfection;
Romanticists drown in feeling’s affection;
Worse, others alternate between extremes;
It’s not this nor that, but of joined direction.
< 39 >
— Harmony —
Each holds within itself the seed of the other:
Yin reaches climax, then retreats in Yang’s favor,
Cyclic movement of rotational symmetry.
Rounded life is the blend of Yin/Yang together.
< 40 >
— Perfect Balance —
Edges dissolve when opposites are balanced;
Time and dimensional space are transcended.
Everything joins, yet remains as itself,
For what ‘is not’ is as great as what ‘is’.
< 41 >
— Blend in Unity —
Strive for a dynamic balance, of light
And dark, Yin and Yang, and wrong and right.
Reality is found not in separate actions,
But in related events blended in twilight.
< 42 >
— One and the Same —
Opposites are just a different view
Of one fundamental phenomenon:
Light, beauty, and goodness are the inverse
Sides of darkness, ugliness, and evil.
< 43 >
— “I’ve Got to Run Now” —
See them hurrying hither and thither:
Oh, look at the time! I must go whither.
What sense the life that has no time to live?
Wherefore the wind that swirls in a dither?
< 44 >
— The Bird of Time —
A moment of eternity in hand,
Caught from a wingéd creature on time’s sand,
But put aside to later view in peace;
It flies! Now pursue it through Never-Land.
< 45 >
— Looking Down the Road —
The walker down the morning path gazes,
To where s/he’ll be when the next trail blazes.
Do we, too, whom this moment calls her own,
Stare past the scene into hazy mazes?
< 46 >
— Drink Deep —
To the morning-star I must say Good-bye,
For the sun’s fire now lights up the whole sky.
Vapors quickly ascend toward heaven’s dome.
Drink; ere life’s dew on the flower be dry!
< 47 >
— Potent Spirit —
In the night lies the healthy breath of morn;
The giant oak sleeps within the acorn;
The flower waits for spring inside the seed;
And so, too, in a daydream, is life born.
< 48 >
— Blurry —
Long we give our time to worry’s hurry,
Going breathless back and forth in scurry,
Making a living, but having no life,
Cold, unseeing, blinded by the flurry.
< 49 >
— Remnant —
In our youth, we hear life’s call clear and plain;
Life is for living, hope and dreams became!
Ere we are aware, the echoes fade;
The regret that’s left does alone remain.
< 50 >
— Walled In —
If we’re a captive of the lifeless day,
A wall around us, brick by brick, does weigh.
Habited we’ll stay until, one day,
Bricks will be moulded from our dusty clay.
< 51 >
— Whence and Whither Flown —
Oh, how life is frittered and thrown away
By running back and forth, this and that way,
In vain pursuit of meaningless details,
When simpler lives can be so, straight away!
< 52 >
— Re-Versed —
No time to taste life’s joy or read a verse?
Too busy for friends? Rushing for the hearse?
Then life’s lost in the living; that’s the curse.
Pause; save a life: simplify, start anew, reverse.
< 53 >
— Return from Oblivion —
Hectic and hurried, we rush to success;
Serenity can’t find us, unless
We slow down, see shades, hear tones, feel textures,
Smell scents, and enjoy life’s loving caress.
< 54 >
— The Absence of Light —
“I’m the darkest,” says the Shadow to the Night.
“No,” says Midnight, “compared to me you’re bright.”
“You floodlights!” says Starless Space, “Stop your fight.
The darkest plight is the lack of love’s delight!”
< 55 >
— Illume —
Waste not the time of this life in gloom’s doom!
By these verses, the lamp of life relume:
“This live body, full of warmth and bloom,
Is worth ten thousand lying in the tomb.”
< 56 >
— The Simple Truth —
After the old excuses we still retell,
And all new advice we as yet expel,
One lone truth remains, undeniable:
There is no excuse for not living well!
< 57 >
— Positive and Negative —
Good and evil are wrought from wrong and right,
When, of nought, twin genii split day and night.
Some may think that black’s might can vanquish white,
But night can’t even quench the smallest light!
< 58 >
— Heaven Found —
Purgatory’s on Venus, where sulfurs rain.
Hell’s found in the sun’s heart, hot burning pain!
Of Heaven’s site, no one has an idea;
It’s the world’s best kept secret: Earth’s its name!
< 59 >
— The Best of All Worlds —
Earth’s a garden, an oasis in space,
A planet of boundless beauty and grace.
One might search the heavens for such in vain,
Finding no equal, any time or place.
< 60 >
— Life’s Joy —
We are life’s eternal creative smile,
Beaming as the universal epistyle.
As beings, the cosmos has come alive,
So we borrow life from death for awhile.
< 61 >
— Earth-Bound —
In Heaven, desired pleasures fall like rain,
Or so we dream, to avoid mortal pain;
But, we needn’t wait for some promise beyond,
Since on Earth, enjoying life, we have the same!
< 62 >
— Not So Remarkable —
Why is Earth for human life so perfect,
But billions of other worlds so unfit?
Well, if this world wasn’t right for life, then
We wouldn’t be here to ask about it!
< 63 >
— A Little Bit of Nothing —
Such from nothing is written our account,
And to nothing we’ll still have to amount,
But, in between those two parentheses
The pluses rain on us from Heaven’s fount.
< 64 >
— Black-Out —
In the darkness, we alight from the Wiz,
And try to make sense of this world of His.
We soon find the ‘answer’ to life’s dark quiz:
We must live this life by what light there is.
< 65 >
— Poet Tree —
Where go the leaves of yesterday, we say,
Aft winter comes and crumbles them away?
They, like us, turn to dust, rejoin the clay,
To rise someday, from unremembered lay.
< 66 >
— White Nights —
Never do we discover a world so white,
As when the snow-field is lit by moonlight.
Oh, it is a crystalline cathedral,
Built from falling stars in the holy night.
< 67 >
— Reverie —
Daydreams are filled with thoughts on promenade:
Wishes, fantasies o’er the mind cascade.
We listen well to plans already made,
For by sundown the phantom shapes may fade.
< 68 >
— In Love —
Castle builders lay stones across the sky;
Dream merchants give gifts of unreality;
Mirages spring to life at slightest touch;
The impossible becomes our reality.
< 69 >
— Do It —
‘Twas a time before birth when we were not;
‘Twill be a time again when we are not.
From Death our life is a borrowed debit;
Let’s spend it, and live it to our credit.
< 70 >
— Visitation —
Heaven rains forth its blessings from above,
In forms of peace, serenity, and love;
Well, either we are lucky, charmed, or both,
For these are the things we were dreaming of.
< 71 >
— Life Savor —
Oh thee, of thine, whence comes this life of mine?
I wish to thank thee for our living wine.
Oh, Nature, Father Time, Guiding Star,
Thanks for throwing us this earthly lifeline.
< 72 >
— Abloom —
At first, we sleep in our dear mother’s womb;
At last, we sleep in the cold silent tomb.
In between, Life whispers a dream that says,
“Wake, live, for the rose withers all too soon!”
< 73 >
— Opportune —
Be wide aware when chance shines as your sun,
For she, in turn, happens on everyone.
Graciously welcome the lady of luck
By recognizing her as Dame Fortune.
< 74 >
— Fear Less —
We fear not death, Heaven, or even Hell,
For death is only life’s natural knell,
And Heaven-Hell are but within ourselves;
The one thing we fear is not living well!
< 75 >
— Making Luck —
Life roots fast in the fertile cracks of day,
From seeds planted along that rocky way.
Like artisans, we mix our work and play,
Nurturing, then harvesting life’s bouquet.
< 76 >
— The Pot and the Rainbow —
Which of the following is more worthwhile:
The rainbow or the gold under its smile?
Well, the rainbow is here and now; the pot
May turn out not to be worth the miles.
< 77 >
— Getting It Together —
As once we were, our presence full beheld
Spirit, body, heart, and mind. Then, in meld,
As more than the parts, we become the whole,
Human beings living lives unparalleled.
< 78 >
— The Time is Now —
Can we seize what’s flown or yet to be sown?
No! So fill the cup and drink-in what’s known!
Since the past dies as the future becomes,
Now’s the only time we can call our own!
< 79 >
— Future Interest Penalty —
Let not the certainty of the present be
Held mortgage for the Deed of Futurity,
For tomorrow’s just a gleam from afar
And yesterday’s but a cold ash of thee.
< 80 >
— The Calendar Revised —
There are two days about which we needn’t ask,
The one that hasn’t come and the one that’s past,
For we live in the paradisal ‘now’,
In which the moment is eternally vast!
< 81 >
— Where is Life? —
How wondrous this! How mysterious that!
There’s nowhere else to look for life’s impact;
We must experience the wonder and
Mystery of life in every single act.
< 82 >
— Dead or Alive? —
“Must I live all that I can, and cannot?
Rather than partway, somewhat, and whatnot?”
“You should know the answer; why even ask?
If you don’t have a life, then what have you got?”
< 83 >
— The Balance Sheet of Existence —
Life on Earth is death’s borrowed debit;
We spend this life on good fortune’s credit.
We’re not as puppets, but free of the strings;
Dispensing with angst, we’re free to live it.
< 84 >
— The New World —
We construct the world that our dreams require,
One moulded closer to our hearts’ desire.
In this world body of a soul inspired,
We’ll live life entire before we expire.
< 85 >
— “To Life” —
Drink the lifeblood of the grapes you’ve sown,
Before pressing time squeezes out thy own.
Do toast with thy chalice and all inspire:
“To life’s red wine I give all that I own!”
< 86 >
— Time After Time —
Lovely moment, come hither unto us;
Embrace us, then, expiring, give birth to
Another just as sweet; you’re ours, all ours,
For you’re giving us the time of our lives!
< 87 >
— Anadem —
Seize the moment or lose its momentum,
Wearing time as the royal diadem;
Richly accelerate life’s momentous gem,
Letting your motto be “Carpe diem”.
< 88 >
— Future-Vision —
Pretend you’re dead, gone, siting on a star,
And regretting, there, an empty memoir:
If only I might live it all again!
So, see no self; then smile, because you are.
< 89 >
— One Spirit Lights Another —
Come light your lantern and mine with good cheer;
We’re magic lamps, our spirits dance in there.
Our beginning and end are of nowhere,
So radiate, since, for now, we are here!