“Where is an intimate friend who’ll hear the secret from me straight out– of what human beings have been from the moment they began? They are born of toil and molded from the clay of sorrow.They wander the world for a time, then set off.”

“Realise this: one day your soulwill depart from your body and you willbe drawn behind the curtain that floats between usand the unknown. While you wait for that moment, be happy,because you don't know where you came from andyou don't know where you will be going.”

“From the house of unbeliefto true religionis a single breath;From the world of doubtto certaintyis a single breath;Enjoy this precious single breath,for the harvestof our whole livesis that same one breath.”

“O friend, for the morrow let us not worryThis moment we have now, let us not hurryWhen our time comes, we shall not tarryWith seven thousand-year-olds, our burden carry”

“How much more of the mosque, of prayer and fasting?Better go drunk and begging round the taverns.Khayyam, drink wine, for soon this clay of yoursWill make a cup, bowl, one day a jar.When once you hear the roses are in bloom,Then is the time, my love, to pour the wine;Houris and palaces and Heaven and Hell-These are but fairy-tales, forget them all.”

“I sometimes think that never blows so redThe Rose as where some buried Caesar bled;That every Hyacinth the Garden wearsDropt in its Lap from some once lovely Head.”

“Then said another -- "Surely not in vain My Substance from the common Earth was ta'en, That He who subtly wrought me into Shape Should stamp me back to common Earth again.”