
These Are My Rooks--What've You Got?
These are the temples at Rameshvaram where Shiva manifested as a towering column of fire. Wouldn't they make perfect rooks?
And now for some piercing words from Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, circa the year 1000:
'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.
It's not every board game that inspires poetry--you don't get a lot of emotional words about Hungry Hungry Hippos or Monopoly, for example.