1. Say to the breeze when the morn rises bright,
And the lightning sheathes its blade in the clouds' despite,

2. That we twain on the sward in love's combat vie,
I rouse him, he wakes me with passionate sigh.

3. Turn and greet for my sake the land of delight
With a greeting as wide as the bounds of its site;

4. Bear to me too the greetings of yearning love
That aspires to reunion however remote.

5. The grape-cluster I love, and its dwellers for aye,
But I love e'en the site for the One who made stay

6. Mid the beds of narcissi those glances of thine,
Since the day that you stamped all my life as your sign.

7. Whensoe'er to those glances my vision would fly,
Not once has it lighted or lingered thereby,

8. But gently they bend; and for couch and for rest
Their herbs are all sweet, and their springs are the best.

9. Their lights chase each other in ceaseless relay,
Till morning appears to fetter the night in their sway;

10. And the plain is a joy in its every resort,
But above all the spot where thy pavilions were pitched.

11. Like Spring is that site, ne'er devoid of delight,
Be it shade, be it sun, be it morning or night.

12. His worth did he tell in his verse and his deed,
God guard what he wrote to make memory succeed!

13. I watch o'er his march, and his pact I regard,
His remembrance is sweet, and his bounty is stored.

14. The best of good deeds is the fairest of fame;
And the best men of God are men only in name.

15. Ofttimes casts off fortune the noble and great,
But this stray-one, O wonder of wonders! her gait

16. Was ever unswerving, her favorite never lost place,
But grew to more grace and more charm and more face.

17. Nay, swear by those nights which we passed hand in hand,
His fellow I ne'er looked on in any known land;

18. No eye in him found fault since his mother him bore,
Nor saw him before, neither shall see such more.

19. Believe me in this, for the warder speaks sure;
His nature is wine, though the form it pass pure.

20. Shall friend to true friend turn unfriendly again?
Nay, brothers are we, and our brotherhood's fain!

21. Times change and divide, but our concord, maybe,
Shall gather, please God, their divided debris.

22. Scarce was it penned by my storm-driven quill,
Which chides his estrangement, the place of his will,

23. When lo, from Ibn Qalaqis the verse-stringèd throng
Flock round me in joy at the hammer-bells' song;

24. And first in their rank marches he, subtle and wise,
Meet comrade for comrades, the glance of whose eyes

25. Ofttimes had encountered on many a tongue
The fame of your graces by all dwellers sung.