FITZGERALD.

TO E. FITZGERALD.

Old Fitz, who from your suburb grange
Where once I tarried for a while,
Glance at the wheeling Orb of change
And greet it with a kindly smile;
Whom yet I see, as there you sit
Beneath your sheltering garden tree,
And watch your doves about you flit
And plant on shoulder, hand and knee,
Or on your head their rosy feet,
As if they knew your diet spares
Whatever moved in that full sheet
Let down to Peter at his prayers;
*
But none can say
That Lenten fare makes Lenten thought,
Who reads your golden Eastern lay,
Than which I know no version done
In English more divinely well;
A planet equal to the sun;
Which cast it, that large infidel
Your Omar: and your Omar drew
Full-handed plaudits from our best
In modern letters....

Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

From:Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám and Salámán and Absál
       Together With A Life Of Edward Fitzgerald And An Essay On
              Persian Poetry By Ralph Waldo Emerson[Pg iv]
Author: Omar Khayyám and Ralph Waldo Emerson Jami

Translator: Edward Fitzgerald