1. Shall I overcome this life or will it overcome me,
While my determination is with me and Al-Mushrifi accompanies me?

2. I protect my ribs from falling in love,
And I leave that to the spears of brave knights.

3. Honor is but a part of my nature,
And glory is just one of my goals.

4. And you, my heart, claim that you are my companion,
While you are just a grindstone amid thorns and tribulations.

5. Were it not for the one whose secret dwelling you have become,
I would have poured you amid the falling tears.

6. Woe to you! What is this anxiety and sorrow
Over something lost from life and gone?

7. What is life but to fill your stomach with wealth
And fill wealth with slaves and maidservants?

8. And to make the crowns of emperors into seats
For the children of slave women and singing girls?

9. I rose at the abode of the beloved with my tears,
While its ruins have risen with calamities.

10. When the winds play with its soil,
The musk is crushed between playthings.

11. O intimate of the heart without its veil,
Your intimate does not meet your love with a frown.

12. Help me with a sword or an excuse you can make,
Otherwise today you are the helper of tribulations.

13. The days tell me, “I have appointed you rich,”
But am I one who takes anything like a giver?

14. I ennoble them by taking from them, for
Every aspirant shines when he takes from them.

15. I count the stars of the night, the sand, and the pebbles,
But I tire counting the wonders.

16. My time is a time whose turns
Have grown old, but my patience does not seek but my requests.

17. Whenever it dragged me into misfortune,
I faced it with acceptance and calm.

18. As one who climbs up a ladder accepts what is handed to him,
Or as the squadrons of horsemen accept their fallen.

19. So O young man of generosity, do not ask him for a pittance, for he
Sees the sea as insufficient to quench the thirst of a drinker.

20. He is generous with what gives you all your land,
Yet you reckon he has only given you some clouds.

21. No day has passed when his swords
Did not embrace the necks of the enemies or the necks of fate.

22. I pledge to every envious person in his writings
Who compares my merits to the high calamities of death.

23. For if you are not more decisive than death in the world,
Then I say fortunes are like it in positions.

24. I remembered you when the sword refused to close its eyelid
And dragged the tail of war over the dust.

25. Are you not India while I am its defender,
Whose abodes are preoccupied with taxes?

26. A sea of blood, the men are its bubbles,
And their horses are in a surge like ships.

27. The sails of death are raised in its sides
Whenever the winds of destruction are raised in it.

28. And every swimmer drowns in its currents -
You established feet there during clashes.

29. And a day in which words clash against it turbulently
With the turbulence of surging waves colliding.

30. You stabbed with the phrase amidst it as if
You stabbed the heart of the addressee with the chest of a spear.

31. Are you not of the people whose palms
Are sharper than white thin swords in striking?

32. Mountains bow low at their call
And necks and litters become too short for them.

33. So do not make me like those whom you have seen
Who make legs like wandering camels.

34. When they see me, they turn away sullenly as if
Their moustaches are knitted with frowns.

35. I seek refuge from a slow master to kindness
Who is quick to respond when food is served hungrily.

36. Does not an ignorant man desist
From his foolishness if he is not beaten, then he is no penitent?

37. I did not respond if I was not called to pray,
Even if my soul drank from the street gutters.

38. That was pride, for long it reached highness
And cut wrath in the chests of the envious.

39. If you saw me smiling,
Mocking the days from every side.

40. You would have seen a young man whose drink is viper venom
And whose food is the edges of scorpion stings.

41. Cool over the betrayals of time and its turns,
Insightful of the remedies for strange tribulations.

42. I concealed my poetic utterances until it harmed me,
And the enemy guessed - guessed like Chosroes with his frown.

43. If it were not but to become famous through his name,
Then this is the time for penetrating stars.

44. I will send forth in the land of Iraq a poem
To whose verses prayers are made during wars.

45. Al-'Ulā and Ma'mar will rely on it
With what they compiled in the book of parables.

46. When read aloud to the rulers of dynasties, its impact
Will yoke their zeal with headbands.

47. I disobeyed the rhymes though they are obedient,
And I revolted against a limit of truth without lover.

48. I consult a heart in you which, if it willed determination
And I revolted against a limit of truth without lover.

49. Before you, Rabīʿah never glanced at me
With the whiteness of meadows and pale faces.

50. So I turned away from their errors and granted them
The eloquence of ʿAbd al-Wudd, Lord of experiences.

51. And I said, "If you write to the Romans after it
Then affix your letters with military units."

52. The seekers of distinction travel the night while I do not see
Your seekers except awaiting consequences.

53. So when they refused everything but disagreement, I left them
While their lion is shackled for the foxes.

54. Let the Āl Mahlab know that I
Have befriended them in glory like intimate friends.

55. So I decided not to praise the times but them
Even if people tempted me with wishes.

56. They surrendered my life to me, so tear it apart
Between my fangs and claws.

57. I will shred it like its turns shredded me,
And take revenge on it for all my requests.