1. Long lances assail her, yet the short ones defame her,
While your blow in dew or in sea is a shower.

2. When the offender seeks respite from you,
You deem it generosity but it is disdain.

3. You captured fortresses and deserts
With perfect control unfamiliar to the soft.

4. The perfume of the wild beast repels them,
So they deny and flee from it in disgust.

5. My tribe never submitted to another in times gone by,
So you know not submission or disgrace.

6. Saddle-pads fret over their double pommels
While the censure mars their cheeks.

7. ‘Amir made presumptions upon her
While your forbearance and dignity4567 insults her.

8. Correspondence and complaining changed her;
She was impressed by play and frivolity.

9. Steeds that test the horsemen,
And horsemen who make the home seem confined.

10. By stopping chasing them
You made souls seek advice in chasing them.

11. You were the upright sword against them
While your sharp blade and heat were in the foes.

12. Thus its edges spent the day in concealment
As if death between you was a shortcut.

13. The pursuit forced them into battle
While fleeing was the keenest of their weapons.

14. They raced with disjointed limbs therein,
Stumbling over their feet in their haste.

15. Every steep ravine hampered them
For their noble rider and excellent steed.

16. Every deafening crash wounds its sides
With blood flowing from both ankles.

17. It neglected every one who turned to it
While its zeal for its rider was a duty.

18. When daylight withdrew its illumination from them,
Two dark nights – one night and the dust – covered them.

19. If the wing of darkness protected them,
Al-Musharrafiyyah8 and daylight exposed them.

20. Behind them a shrouded one cried the weeping
Of a camel-driver or merchant or bedouin.

21. The clouds of dust covered the bayda’
Until the landmarks and roads were obscured.

22. They passed the tax-collectors as
The two armies gathered like the tying of a loincloth.

23. They reached Saḥṣaḥ9 without saddles
As the turban and veil slipped away.

24. The virgins drooped, doubled up behind
And the young lambs stumbled.

25. Nu‘ayr was emptied so there was no Nu‘ayr,
Neither Nihayy nor Buyayḍah nor Jifār.

26. No one sought help but Tadmur
And Tadmur destroyed them as its name suggests.

27. They intended to reconsider regarding it,
But it greeted them in the morning with a resolute decision.

28. An army with which, whenever they disputed a land,
They came and went confused within it.

29. It was surrounded by a desolate waterless wasteland,
With no blood-money to be driven, or apologies to be made.

30. Its swords poured the blood of enemies
And its valor spilled every drop that was shed.

31. They were lions with no knives for birds
Nor feathers enabling them to fly.

32. When they missed with their spears it reached for them
With spears of thirst from the barren waste.

33. They saw death before and behind them
So they chose it out of necessity.

34. If the unguided ventured onto the highway
Its two eyes were for them a beacon.

35. Were it not for the survivors, no life would remain
And without the past, lessons could not be learned.

36. When their master does not watch over them
Then who can watch over them and be jealous?

37. Wretchedness separates them while fortune unites them,
As does the carpenter with his adze.

38. He turned toward a hill and plain,
And the genteel people seek his tomb.

39. The Banū Numayr bellowed by the Euphrates,
But their bellowing was the bellowing of shame.

40. They lie dead around the Khābūr,
Laid low without tasting anything but their own bitter draught.

41. No cattle were pastured for them in the morning
Nor fire kindled for them at night.

42. Beware of the youth when he is not pleased with them,
For then wariness will not benefit them.

43. Their delegations by night travel to placate him,
Seeking the pardon that they request.

44. He repulsed them by returning the tribute,
Although their protecting companion took it with him.

45. They are those whose noble origin and lineage
Proved their excellence for him.

46. They have a right to your partnership in valor,
And the least partnership is friendship.

47. Perhaps their sons will be troops for your sons,
As the first to tame a noble steed is praised.

48. You are more righteous than one who, if he erred, perished,
And more forgiving than one whose forgiveness was depravity.

49. You are more able when success arouses you to action
And more forbearing when power gives you forbearance.

50. There is no shame in the tyranny of the great ones,
Nor dishonor in the humility of servants.

51. The rays of sunlight are manifest in you,
So our eyes are dazzled by its reflection.

52. Whoever seeks battle, ‘Alī is here,
As well as the steeds of Allah and the ardent heroes.

53. The people saw him in the land of Ka‘b,
A land whose settlements offer no concealment.

54. The deserts display him each day,
Seekers seeking, not awaiting the sought.

55. His cavalry answers, line after line,
War horses do not habitually conceal their voices.

56. O Banū Ka‘b, what a mark you have left in them,
A blow that only bracelets can cure.

57. In it is anguish and loss from a piece
And in it is pride in his greatness.

58. They have a right to your partnership in valor
And the least partnership is neighborliness.

59. Perhaps their sons will be troops for your sons,
As the first to tame a noble steed is praised.

60. You are more righteous than one who, if he erred, perished,
And more forgiving than one whose forgiveness was depravity.