1. Have you seen what the days have done to us?
Solace is lost and dreams have strayed.

2. News that rends breasts apart from anguish,
While the perils of censure are scorned and suppressed.

3. And a tragedy has assailed the king of the world,
Its gates, while the guards lie sleeping.

4. The men's resolve melted at its command; bonds of love now untied,
As if, though seated, they stand.

5. And their opinions rendered powerless - you see them
With no resolve, or binding pact.

6. Perplexed, so that if addressed or addressing
They have no understanding, or clear expression.

7. Like a scabbard bereft of its blade in the fray,
Its strap discarded, with no system or order.

8. And the spring - the copious rain takes away its branches' yield,
While, avoiding harm, the pair of tattooed dark doves escaped.

9. A cleft is not made save in the side of an aged oryx,
From which fault and blemish are absent when mature.

10. Only the base leaves the priceless, but the noble
When priceless is gone take no shame.

11. War snatches away the valiant, while the weak,
The cowardly, the flinching remain preserved from it.

12. Cubs - their cubs - in whom nobility runs out:
For us, after them remain the scavenging hyenas.

13. An oryx herd whose leader expires:
When one perishes, for him remain the vultures.

14. Time has taken a soul, and left souls behind:
Then go, dove, and no blame is upon you.

15. More deserving than us to weep for him whom
Time robbed of favor and grace.

16. The horses, their necks now bowed down,
As if their saddlebags and harnesses were graves and cinders.

17. Neither have they approached the descent, nor has the saddle
Or bridle been absent from them.

18. Let the blunt lance, made mute, weep - paralyzed
Are its movements, and the old barren palm trunk.

19. Those who delayed have pitched their travel-worn mounts' forelocks
In his courtyard - halted there, annihilated.

20. They hastened at dawn, to seize the riches, and take their ease
When the fruits of dew had ripened, they stayed on.

21. O you who have outstripped the elders, though a youth,
And collected the fruits of old age while still a boy.

22. The ways of youth slink away from your sober piety,
And sins avoid the sanctity of your retreat.

23. You passed away before calumny's uncertainty about you cleared,
Nor did sins cleave to you.

24. Only the hearts - they now quake with grief
For your day, and tears flow copiously.

25. What! By the tomb you were made to dwell,
Should no cloud pass over its soil?

26. It should suffice it, when life lies frozen, your own pouring,
As clouds mass, or rain pours in torrents.

27. Or that no garden adjoins his tomb, while yours,
By your eminence, is a garden and haven.

28. Or that no friends visit him, while by you
Stands one greeting and invocation to God.

29. A grave that rends hearts - and before it
Tombs themselves are rent asunder.

30. Defiled before it are inviolable spirits,
While, beside it, cattle themselves are defiled.

31. We are here but for demise; it is but
The days that delude us with their passage.

32. And if you reflect upon time you find it
Fleeting, with the days of life but ill.

33. We rise and retire laughing, but it is
Morn and eve that laugh at our weeping.

34. We rejoice at the new year, but it is the years
That pace us inexorably towards demise.

35. Each day, one of us strides toward the belly of the earth, to our place of rest,
A visitor never to return, irredeemably gone.

36. So entrust to us the protected kingdom of the King of Kings,
With you holding its reins fast from disasters.

37. Fate refuses as you refuse, and does not
Cease to flow as the Pens decree.

38. Success and prosperity to those you befriend,
Subjugation and oppression to those you loathe.

39. For the kingdom - since its affairs were raised unto you -
Is inviolable by all men.