1. Who will protect me from the nights that turn?
The ages have passed, but for what purpose?

2. Darkness has enveloped me, till I seem
A specter in the obscurity of existence.

3. Every night ends, but mine has stretched
Its ropes endlessly, denying end.

4. Every night has stars, but where are mine
Compared to those that stud my firmament?

5. The sun leaps up in heaven, while my sun
Is fettered, a thousand chains deny ascent.

6. Whenever I see aught but my own fortune,
That sullen, glowering, joyless visage, woe!

7. It is a deep ravine wherein sadly
I dwell, downcast, eternally distraught.

8. Never have its sunless stones known laughter
Or traced upon them moonbeams’ soft assault.

9. Asleep, darkness awaits me, or I wake
To find the blackness massed before my gaze.

10. I grope the road, mid doubt, perplexity,
And wander lost, to left hand or to right.

11. I feel the very wind, it is my guide,
Whether I turn northward or south I hie.

12. Whene’er I strive from it to win release
Someday, my wits and stratagems all fail.

13. In vain unto the lofty manors’ lords
I loose my moan from out the sunless wold.

14. Who can endure a lifelong night whose length
Defies surcease, roving from wold to wold,

15. Restive ‘mid lowland swamps, breathless to scale
Unscalable pinnacles of mountain heights,

16. Where mock the Jinn or moan the desert gales
In a Sahara where Spring never blooms

17. But woven for you is all you wish of sand,
Untrod by humankind, without resort.

18. Dread overwhelms the vitals, timorous fear,
Its surface sterile, rugged as a blade,

19. Endlessly stretching like a hope gone wrong,
Whose limits no persistence can invade.

20. Therein the sightless strayed, a waif, distraught,
His course unsure, unknowing where to turn.

21. In its roar no cool wind gave him ease,
Nor soothed its furious heat the shade of palm.

22. His staff grew tired of ceaseless blows that rained
Upon the ground, marking his hapless state.

23. His voice is raised, but no respondent stirs—
The universe emptied of all mortal souls!

24. And who is there in a lagoon of woe
That is his world, his days in long array?

25. Darkness on darkness crowds each one before,
As nights repeat themselves night after night.

26. The ocean gapes to suck him down full fain,
Then casts him up again, all members smashed.

27. You glimpse no more than hands that signal need
When tongues are stilled, all power to speak denied.

28. While winds, yes winds assail the poor and weak
Like lifetimes prey upon contracted spans.

29. He hears the ships around him trumpet blasts
Of parting, but who cares for one like him?

30. He hears the dance, the music, voices lifted
In union’s bliss or loss’s long lament.

31. The happy tribe ignores him, turns away,
Amused by wine and daughters of the great.

32. Why trouble their delights with such a wretch
Who piles disasters on his own head?

33. They want no pall to mar their feast’s decor
With plaints of woe or cries of misery.

34. So harden hearts! How base a boast that they
Can shame man’s dignity and noble strain!

35. Who will this sightless one a staff extend?
Though tight his belly, never he complained.

36. Whoever saw him saw the mass of woes,
An emaciated shamble, nothing more—

37. The prime of youth, yet bowed his head like eld’s,
Humble as those whom weight of years has drained.

38. Silent as darkness, mourners might suppose
In his gaunt form man’s anguish truly spelled.

39. Lost to all light and life—after the eyes,
Can lips know sweetness or the taste of joy?

40. Afflicted by misfortune and mankind,
He bore time’s outrage, victim of disdain.

41. He never viewed the blossom-dotted fields
With coloring bright, or glory in their prime.

42. He never raised his eyes to heaven’s face
Or marked its shining hosts in vast array.

43. He never saw the Nile in winding trains
With skirted tails stride proudly, long and lithe.

44. He never knew the silver of the dawn
Or on night’s glossy locks delighted gazed.

45. Then let him witness human majesty
If life has cheated him of beauty’s sight.

46. Let him feel tenderness and kindness too
If brightness never blessed his searching gaze.

47. ‘God takes one thing and gives another thing
And recompenses justly, without fail.’

48. He senses dangers to the spirit none
Suspect, where creeping worms of greed assail.

49. And unconfused, he sees the truth glow bright
In all its glory, thus illuminated.

50. Sheikh Ibn Arabi shone like a planet
In the long darkness of past ages’ night,

51. And, as foretold, the seal of those his peer,
Annulled perceptions of the learned elite

52. Succor the helpless and the destitute
Shield them from shame and being downtrod

53. Teach them—some doorway may to living ope
Provide the keys that open every lock

54. Do not compound his blindness with ignorance
Lest he know greater woe and doubled knocks

55. All of time’s slings one can in patience bear
Except the sightlessness of minds untaught

56. Teach him, for knowledge is the lamp of life
Scorn not to act, hesitate not to give

57. If time and family and friends abandon him
Then for such a one prove kinder kin

58. Revelation calls to treat the blind with care
And openhanded meet another’s needs

59. Let generations telling Egypt’s tale
For ages hence prepare, make straight their path.

60. With hands so generous, privation’s gloom
Shall be dispelled, and nations seek the heights.

61. Gone want and riches, but the righteous works
Shall by the doers in remembrance live!