#Haiku: Fate

-By Linda Lee Lyberg

man, merely a pawn

fate, the fearless opponent

triumphs over will

Copyright©2017

Linda Lee Lyberg

Carpe Diem #1308 A Game of Chess

Here is the quatrain Chèvrefeuille has given us to work with.

‘Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.

© Omar Khayyam (Tr. FitzGerald)

Background:

Life is likened to a game of Chess or Checkers, the black and white squares of the Chess-board being likened to Nights and Days. Destiny is the player who captures (slays) pieces in the course of the game, removing them from the board and putting them back in the storage box (Closet.) It is Destiny too, who finishes the game – “mates” in Line 3 is “Check Mate” – the term for the end of a Game of Chess. The overall idea is that Destiny kills us all off, one by one.