LITMIR.BIZ

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The hard-held ponies swing,

       So long as Tara Devi sees

       The lights of Simla town,

       So long as Pleasure calls us up,

       Or Duty drives us down,

       If you love me as I love you

       What pair so happy as we two?

      So long as Aces take the King,

       Or backers take the bet,

       So long as debt leads men to wed,

       Or marriage leads to debt,

       So long as little luncheons, Love,

       And scandal hold their vogue,

       While there is sport at Annandale

       Or whisky at Jutogh,

       If you love me as I love you

       What knife can cut our love in two?

      So long as down the rocking floor

       The raving polka spins,

       So long as Kitchen Lancers spur

       The maddened violins,

       So long as through the whirling smoke

       We hear the oft-told tale—

       "Twelve hundred in the Lotteries,"

       And Whatshername for sale?

       If you love me as I love you

       We'll play the game and win it too.

      So long as Lust or Lucre tempt

       Straight riders from the course,

       So long as with each drink we pour

       Black brewage of Remorse,

       So long as those unloaded guns

       We keep beside the bed,

       Blow off, by obvious accident,

       The lucky owner's head,

       If you love me as I love you

       What can Life kill or Death undo?

      So long as Death 'twixt dance and dance

       Chills best and bravest blood,

       And drops the reckless rider down

       The rotten, rain-soaked khud,

       So long as rumours from the North

       Make loving wives afraid,

       So long as Burma takes the boy

       Or typhoid kills the maid,

       If you love me as I love you

       What knife can cut our love in two?

      By all that lights our daily life

       Or works our lifelong woe,

       From Boileaugunge to Simla Downs

       And those grim glades below,

       Where, heedless of the flying hoof

       And clamour overhead,

       Sleep, with the grey langur for guard

       Our very scornful Dead,

       If you love me as I love you

       All Earth is servant to us two!

      By Docket, Billetdoux, and File,

       By Mountain, Cliff, and Fir,

       By Fan and Sword and Office-box,

       By Corset, Plume, and Spur

       By Riot, Revel, Waltz, and War,

       By Women, Work, and Bills,

       By all the life that fizzes in

       The everlasting Hills,

       If you love me as I love you

       What pair so happy as we two?

Certain Maxims of Hafiz

       Table of Contents

       I.

      If It be pleasant to look on, stalled in the packed serai,

       Does not the Young Man try Its temper and pace ere he buy?

       If She be pleasant to look on, what does the Young Man say?

       "Lo! She is pleasant to look on, give Her to me today!"

       II.

      Yea, though a Kafir die, to him is remitted Jehannum

       If he borrowed in life from a native at sixty per cent. per annum.

       III.

      Blister we not for bursati? So when the heart is vexed,

       The pain of one maiden's refusal is drowned in the pain of the next.

       IV.

      The temper of chums, the love of your wife, and a new piano's tune—

       Which of the three will you trust at the end of an Indian June?

       V.

      Who are the rulers of Ind—to whom shall we bow the knee?

       Make your peace with the women, and men will make you L. G.

       VI.

      Does the woodpecker flit round the young ferash?

       Does grass clothe a new-built wall?

       Is she under thirty, the woman who holds a boy in her thrall?

       VII.

      If She grow suddenly gracious—reflect. Is it all for thee?

       The black-buck is stalked through the bullock, and Man through jealousy.

       VIII.

      Seek not for favor of women. So shall you find it indeed.

       Does not the boar break cover just when you're lighting a weed?

       IX.

      If He play, being young and unskilful, for shekels of silver and gold,

       Take his money, my son, praising Allah. The kid was ordained to be sold.

       X.

      With a "weed" among men or horses verily this is the best,

       That you work him in office or dog-cart lightly—but give him no rest.

       XI.

      Pleasant the snaffle of Courtship, improving the manners and carriage;

       But the colt who is wise will abstain from the terrible thorn-bit of Marriage.

       XII.

      As the thriftless gold of the babul, so is the gold that we spend

       On a derby Sweep, or our neighbor's wife, or the horse that we buy from a

       friend.

       XIII.

      The ways of man with a maid be strange, yet simple and tame

       To the ways of a man with a horse, when selling or racing that same.

       XIV.

      In public Her face turneth to thee, and pleasant Her smile when ye meet.

       It is ill. The cold rocks of El-Gidar smile thus on the waves at their feet.

      In public Her face is averted, with anger. She nameth thy name.

      

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