"I laid him low and hurried home to indite A book, the fruit of all my Thought and Travel, Entitled 'Contemplation of the Navel,' A mystic book. (But first I learned to write.) Such of our doctors as can read have read it. But I was bent on even higher credit. "I sought a cave whence madmen hunt wild sheep, And there for thirteen years I held my head, Until the dupes decided I was dead. Indeed I spent the better part in sleep, Lest I should be beguiled from abstract chatter By lust for this world's striped and dazzling matter. "Night brought me counsel, and a pock-marked Kurd Or angels brought me food. Day spared my dreams That tilled the solitude like slow white teams Of oxen, till it blossomed, and I heard The Roc's huge pinions scour the starry cobbles; And so I rose above all human squabbles. "For me the burning haze made sandhills dance, Till blushing shadows covered their nude breasts. The eternal heirs of leisure were my guests, And feasted on my glory in advance. Then on an eve among the eves.... The End! My soul sat by me talking as a friend. "I bleached my beard, and came to Ispahan. You know the rest. To Allah's will I bowed In suffering the plaudits of the crowd, For all must listen; those must preach who can. I stirred the town with fingers raised to bless.... And gauged the people by my emptiness." The caravan was gone. Its song survived A little, faint, an echo, not at all. Then like a magic carpet warmth was drawn Back into heaven, and left behind a void Where thin-faced breezes, huddling from the hills, Sat down to breathe hard tales upon their hands. And suddenly earth looked her age. Like her The shapes round Ali-el-Kerbelaï shivered, Pulling their coloured _abbas_ to their ears And drawing in their feet. At last one spoke: "O master, you to whom the world is known, What is your thought's conclusion, what the sum Of added knowledge in the tome of YOU?" And Ali answered weighing out his words: "Sir, I have seen the East and West, great peace, Great wars, indifferent fates that blessed or cursed Their builders. I have touched the best and worst In flesh and thought, have watched flames rise and cease, Consoled high hopes, deep passions, men that die For things beneath the earth, behind the sky, "For god or woman. I have counted change For the Sarraf of Changelessness, have marked Kings, Wazirs, coursed by sons of dogs that barked And bit, the uninhabitable range Of power, where all that climb in others' shoes Are honoured and unperched like cockatoos.