1. O Abaa Mustafa, we did mention you among us
So a yearning for you took hold of us along with the mention

2. And an hour of joy has gathered us
It is life, not what has passed in times gone by

3. And an ardent lover competed with us about you
While we were in a palace overlooking a river

4. And the river's water rose after its ebbs
So excellent was that rise after those ebbs

5. Until its trees were clothed and swayed
To the melodies of birds amidst the green leaves

6. And doves warbled above them
With the tones of the distressed from the pain of separation

7. And a mute regaled us in thanking you
With the sweetest poetry that was said about you

8. And he entertained us in every art he masters
Sometimes with rhymed prose and other times with verse

9. And we delighted in what was narrated about you
With a drunkenness that spares the boon companion wine

10. It melted just as the first swallow of wine melts
Which the lasting drinker imagines is pure musk

11. If you were present among us and found us
With rivers flowing beneath us at that time

12. You would say, "Seize the moment of companionship and hand over
The oversights of fate to the turns of fate"

13. It is glorious Basra, nothing equals it
And by my life, it surpasses Egypt

14. Except that I became among the conclusion of suffering
Which I endure, and the last in my thoughts