rain and more rain

I hope it's not raining like this on Saturday and Sunday when I'm showing my parents round Leeds; it won't help. Well, there are sufficient shops and canopies and arcades and whatnot that we could avoid at least some of it, but it doesn't help the mood.

I'm going to be so zonked on Monday. (Mother arrives Friday; Father arrives Saturday; both leave Sunday.) Possibly I should not build my wake/sleep schedule on heavy recuperation at the weekends. Shame on me.

Can't wait to see them, though.

---

O Where Are You Going?

"O where are you going?" said reader to rider,
"That valley is fatal when furnaces burn,
Yonder's the midden whose odours will madden,
That gap is the grave where the tall return."

"O do you imagine," said fearer to farer,
"That dusk will delay on your path to the pass,
Your diligent looking discover the lacking
Your footsteps feel from granite to grass?"

"O what was that bird," said horror to hearer,
"Did you see that shape in the twisted trees?
Behind you swiftly the figure comes softly,
The spot on your skin is a shocking disease."

"Out of this house," said rider to reader,
"Yours never will," said farer to fearer,
"They're looking for you," said hearer to horror,
As he left them there, as he left them there.

-- W. H. Auden

with good wine

Notes on the day:

a) Lots of work.

b) My mother got here safely.

c) Sous Le Nez En Ville is an absolutely magnificent restaurant.

I think I'm going to go and flop now.

---

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Oh, come with old Khayyam, and leave the Wise
To talk; one thing is certain, that Life flies;
One thing is certain, and the Rest is Lies;
The Flower that once has blown forever dies.

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument
About it and about; but evermore
Came out by the same Door as in I went.

With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with my own hand labour'd it to grow:
And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd ---
'I came like Water and like Wind I go.'

-- Omar Khayyam