Analysis Of The Rubaiyat Of Omar Khayyam

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and so on ad nauseum. Again, in the fifty-third stanza: "You gaze
To-Day, while You are You-how then/ Tomorrow, You when shall be You no
more?" The poet seems to be in an incredible hurry to get this life going
before some cosmic deadline comes due, and more than willing to encourage
any of the laiety he encounters in the course of the poem to do the same.
Another recurring motif throughout the poem is the time-
honored act of downing a few drinks. It appears that either "Wine", the
"Cup" or "Bowl", and the "Grape" touch every stanza in the poem; the
narrator seems to be an alcoholic. In the fifty-sixth stanza he dismisses
everything so he can get drunk, having divorced Reason and married the
Daughter of the Vine in the previous stanza: "Of all that one should care
to fathom, I/ Was never deep in anything but-Wine." Later the narrator
compares the Grape to an angel. It's clear this person has something of an
obsession.
But all of these seemingly transparent references ...

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is a symbol for life and
the act of living. It's also a curse-no cup is bottomless, so it follows
that:

a) you can't enjoy the wine unless you drink it, but
b) the more you drink, the quicker it ends.

Now a different theme arises from the symbols the author is
using. Is it really time to "Seize the Day" and drink it up while we have
the chance? The sixty-third stanza uses another symbol to explain it: "One
thing is certain and the rest is Lies/ The Flower that once has blown for
ever dies." Throughout the poem death is seen as being an empty cup
(Stanza 72): "And that inverted Bowl they call the Sky,/ Whereunder
crawling coop'd we live and die," and in ...

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