The Rubaiyat of Umar Khaiyam

The Rubaiyat of Umar Khaiyam. Done into English from the French of J.B. Nicolas by Frederick Baron Corvo together with a reprint of the French text. With an introduction by Nathan Haskell Dole. London ; New York, John Lane The Bodley Head, 1903. [iv]+xiv+[248] pp.

464 quatrains

Potter 570

The Ruba’yat of Omar Khayam

The Ruba’yat of Omar Khayam. Translated by H.M. Cadell. With an introduction by Richard Garnett. London ; New York, John Lane, The Bodley Head, 1899. xxx, 52 p.

144 quatrains

Potter 316 – Cadell Edition

The Old Woman who lived in a Shoe

The Old Woman who lived in a Shoe.
In: The poets in the nursery. By Charles Powell with an introduction by John Drinkwater.
London ; New York : Lane, The Bodley Head, 1920. 80 p. Pp. 57-59.
7 quatrains.

Potter 1177

The Old Woman who lived in a Shoe

Omar Khayyám

Some for the Patter of Little Feet: and some
Sigh for their Flight to the Nothing whence they come.
Ah, take the Chance and let the Children go.
Risk any Fate but an eternal Drum.

Lo, that marineless Boat they call a Shoe,
That shelters Me and my Rebellious Crew,
I’d strip it of its leather, potent-tanned,
And potently I’d tan the Children, too.

The Boy no question makes of has his Nose
Been wiped or not, or where the wiper goes.
Ask Him that spheres aloft the Gilded Three:
He knows about it all — He knows —HE knows!

There was the Keyhole that refused the Key:
There was the Pail that set the Water free
And when I ask, Who bored, who bunged the Hole?
Each renders answer, “Oh, it wasn’t Me!”

And when Another of the precious Lot
Is set to make the Water boiling hot,
And round the Pot still Potters, and I say,
“You’ve let the Pot run dry,” —”Oh, go to Pot!”

I sometimes think that never tastes so dead
The Broth as when it’s eaten sans the Bread:
That every Palm-tree in the Desert bears
A Bough for smiting some young Dunderhead.

A Look of Curses underneath the Bough,
A Juggle, a Whine, no Loaf, but Bed—and thou-
-sand Jackals howling in the Wilderness,
Beside It, were as parodies “Miaou!”