1. The eyes of desire have wounded my heart with your gaze,
And the meaning of my passion for you is explained with tears.

2. No chest but blazes with sorrow,
No eyelid but is wounded with weeping.

3. My friend denied that my tears
Poured over one who left the abode desolated.

4. So let me, when the inflammation of love kindles,
In it correct the vestiges of youth.

5. And I said that yearning was no ember,
So why does it flare when the wind blows?

6. I remain when dawn breaks with my hearing primed by their mention,
As if I am a watchman awake in Babylon.

7. I contend with yielding patience but patience charges ahead,
And I conceal what I endure though complaining gives vent.

8. So ask not about hidden feelings if you're ignorant of them,
A furtive gesture suffices, and a wave of the hand.

9. I love ardour and passion with the coolness of its breeze,
And its coolness is but anguish and consolation.

10. And my fervour is fanned by its flames and heat,
What fire is not sparked by swinging brands?

11. It was easy to forget on the day of parting at Suwayqah,
Though a heart had turned, desolate, from forgetfulness.

12. One evening my heart was tied to the saddlebags,
Free to journey as it pleased, released to tears.

13. When separation denied us seeing her,
No stream flowed on the slopes, no pasture greened for the grazing beasts,

14. No seeker found in her breaths that tablet,
Why do my tears not pay their due

15. To a cheek smoothed by the fine razor?
What marvel is that beauty whose Lord

16. Turns a body to desire yet leaves no soul?
I stood weeping at that spring,

17. Finding only bitterness in waters mixed with tears,
Every door but Abū Muʿizz ibn Yūsuf’s

18. Leading to all good, closed by fate yet left open,
He is the impoverished one bountifully bestowing, his habit of giving

19. Adorning the excellences, exposing the defects.
He is the slender-waisted one, lofty of shoulders,

20. When faced with days of thirst, pouring water.
In every fear and crisis he is the refuge,

21. Neither neighbor cheated nor guest betrayed.
His pastures are like safety, cool, his provisions

22. Like sweet basil, freely offered to whomever desired.
He brings intellects to life, infusing them with purity and wisdom,

23. Selecting meanings, refining and correcting.
So his prose is beautifully eloquent and delightful,

24. His verse melodiously eloquent and embellished.
His prayer has guided to us the bestowal of gifts

25. And brought to him the presentation of the finest praises.
When you attend upon his fire’s hearths

26. The fragrance of aloeswood disperses, the place perfumed.
If the night concealed its gatherings in homes,

27. His wide renown and the winds would point to them.
A bearer of tribulations’ burdens, were he to hurl

28. A mountain, it would be reduced to pebbles at his touch.
If he had the patience of those now gone

29. No lamenting Noah would grieve for a drowned people.
Repeat his description, pleasing God by mentioning him,

30. In all of him glorifying God.
It was he who sated an army with the cups of his dove-house,

31. Poured hastily as the cavalry charged.
O you whose sword harvested equity in the heights,

32. No witness but by you was wounded!
A young man whose resolve equated a battalion,

33. Though his arm weakened from being severed at the joint.
No life but is devoted to the battle-trained steeds,

34. No heart but is wedded to the blades.
Gazing upon the enemy from every side,

35. Though many armored knights circled his arena.
They are mountains, their armor sheathed yet light in movement,

36. Muzain's cavalry flesh yet spectral in their charge.
When they chanced upon a brook they did not brawl,

37. When they marched at night no owl hooted.
Green robes, laughing with dew

38. When the banner swayed and the anthems roared.
They love the white of honorable deeds and gazelles,

39. The people love whiteness and pale gazelles.
Obeyed whether clear or obscured in the fray,

40. Trustees in the hard years of dearth, igniting the darkness,
Kindling in grim nights a fire with many flames

41. Both its tongues in the dark like lamps.
They are the steeds of pulpits and the fray altogether,

42. And the stoutest in conflict, swinging with the tents.
Among the people you find none resembling them,

43. Nor on earth, but crying out in their glory.
Times were illuminated by you and the sun is redundant,

44. No spark flashing from the hooves struck forth.
It's excusable one who dreads you, like the lead beast

45. Of a vanquished troop, its horn broken, prone.
Iron only prospers when it resembles you,

46. How many a sword has been refined by your edge!
While you remain, neither can the lawless mob in the wasteland sleep safe

47. Nor their night fireless, their water undrunk.
You have encompassed us with security, neither wealth

48. Nor delights but in your protection left untouched.
How often have I been given a bride by you with a generous dowry,

49. So I'm neither cheated nor you shamed!
Her sweetness provokes envy but I have not found one envying you

50. Stabbed by honey as with a poisoned blade.
She is the composer of sublime verses

51. For which you provide a novel and well-weighted arrangement.
One whose generosity rivals yours is fortunate in love

52. While another whose greed rivals yours is banished.
The wares of glory, their market never ceases

53. When you appear but your munificence proclaimed.
The people are only either one you have rewarded

54. For my sake, or one pardoned despite his crimes.
You continue seizing the fields for their rightful owners,

55. And the oppressor lies vanquished by your resolve, prone.
I struggle for wealth that obstacles prevent me from,

56. Like one seeking water while sandstorms rage.
How often have you revived me with gracious gifts

57. To blessed and prosperous outcomes despite the times!
So I returned with eyes delighted by your company

58. And my breast expanded by such noble gifts.
You have adorned the world and lived praised,

59. Peerless, for none on earth rivals you in praise.