1. I remembered you, and the Yemeni star was as if
It had contended with Sirius, igniting passion’s fire.

2. So I said to my friends when a cloud appeared
In Nejd, “By God, do you not see?”

3. They said, “We see lightning rending it,
Dazzling sights beyond the eyes’ endurance.”

4. Must you every day roam her lands,
With two eyes of a man drowned in them?

5. My eyes, O my eyes, you Ultimacy, you are
Agitated by parting from Umm al-Ghamr.

6. Are you not just scouts against me
Nearby my enemies, far from my abode?

7. When my eyes grow pale, my friends say
“To what do your eyes keep hastening?”

8. I pardoned you, O my right eye, for weeping
So what ails you, O defective one, O bleary one?

9. No! Bear me, God bless you both,
To my fresh water which you seek.

10. For by the water you seek
Is a lover whose color has faded for ages—

11. Of soft down, sweet drink, good smell—
He has charms that do not cease for a time.