1. I heard that helping me would pain my master,
So I said, "If only that pain were in my eye!"

2. I wish the parts of fever were its dwelling,
So from them skin for ransom could be paid.

3. If love learned how bodies sicken,
Then look at me—I am that body!

4. I am the stranger who, if he died in a land,
None would mourn him but the tears of a friend.

5. When he wept he'd inscribe his tears on the earth—
Traces that do not vanish or end.

6. The burial mound crumbles from my bones
Whenever I am worn away, and still the bramble grows over it.

7. I have no pact with the shooting star I mentioned
Unless blood poured copiously from my liver.

8. A house I knew where pleasures were manifold,
And you, O pillar of the lofty ones, were my pillar.

9. For between us passion turned like the celestial sphere,
And we were in our prime, hand and mouth.

10. Nights were sleepless from ecstasy and, vexed,
Nearly rent the shreds of stars apart.

11. After intentions in me climbed to fourths,
And after you my fresh successors took my youth,

12. The dawns of wealth threatened me with departures,
And distance between us continued to grow.

13. Until we met, and my valleys shone because of you,
For you were the one they had promised me.

14. O heart, leave passion and look at his greeting,
For from it you met snow and hail.

15. If he returned me before the feast, his rising
Was for me—let tomorrow be for others!

16. And if in praising him I stand alone,
Then the glory of Saladin stands alone!

17. I said, In Egypt I have no feast that delights me,
Unless from Saladin I find what I find.