1. For I am the unluckiest of creatures,
So all misfortune departs when I arrive.

2. And when I came among people shamelessly,
I learned wickedness along with the impossible.

3. I roam about people's homes at night,
And bray like a donkey and mule.

4. A drink in the cups appears aflame
When blended from clear water.

5. It is the wine before which my mind
Floats about in confusion.

6. At times reciting elegant poetry,
At others babbling nonsense like a phantom.

7. And you see me as a messenger for entertainers
When I spot a beauty with charm.

8. And how often I spend the night dancing in the square
With the poor, jumping through hoops.

9. And you'd think I was in rapture and ecstasy,
When I have nothing but the meanderings of one lost.

10. Eating rats and lizards is my habit,
Along with the jester, Antara or Bilal.

11. I beg in the market baring my head and shoulder,
Collecting with torches and poles.

12. And I danced debke and went around collecting
On a monkey who learned from my deeds.

13. I taught dogs to dance after me,
And trained parakeets in cages.

14. I gambled in a thief's den,
Casting dice, accursed in deed.

15. And how often I butted rams, butting,
And provoked roosters into fighting.

16. But I saw knowledge as an adornment,
So I returned to school and debate.

17. I stood firm and became a judge among jurists,
Issuing edicts on the forbidden and permissible.

18. And composing poetry I became unmatched at it,
With it I surmounted the towering heights.

19. I scan prosody with fa'ilatun,
With strings and cords of burden.

20. And the science of grammar, wherein declension is my art,
Upon whoever has status and wealth.

21. And I treated people medically, and how many
I killed with dosing and purging.

22. And I cured eyes, and how many eyelids
Did not sleep all night long due to my kohl.

23. And I became a philosopher of standing,
Debating nonsense and the absurd.

24. And my knowledge of herbs and compounds,
Which the veterinarian taps with his shoes.

25. And I returned to cemeteries as a preaching shaykh,
And reciter over their ruined graves.

26. And I cast modesty behind me,
And ceased to care what I did.