1. Listen to the call of a lonely stranger
Who prays much but finds few to answer,

2. Who comes to you with courageous worries,
Yet shrinks from you in bashful veilings.

3. Certainty leads him to you,
Yet doubt makes him suspect illusion.

4. Does your hearing grant me from afar,
When your gaze has entranced me from nearby?

5. How can the passions of a dear heart rejoice
In the playfulness of a blithe heart?

6. So he called you amidst the darkness of neglect
And whispered to you in the shadows of adversities,

7. With eloquence honed for lofty aspirations
By the behests of the near one who answers.

8. As commanded for a neighbor and wayfarer
And made incumbent on an oppressed stranger,

9. And for the sincere devotion the King granted you,
Testing you with the trials of ready blades,

10. So He adorned you with the honor of His eyes
That you may advance His banners in wars,

11. And lit your lamp amidst the palaces
That your excellence may rise above the roads.

12. Thus you shepherded the sincerity of a grateful freeman
Dressed in the allegiance of a repenting servant,

13. And clad him in the advice of an unblemished bosom,
Trustworthy in returning the trusts of pockets.

14. You lead to him the hopes of the distant one,
And recite before him the praises of the near one,

15. And encounter on his behalf the faces of lovers
With good tidings of affection and the arrival of the beloved.

16. How many platforms of loftiness God built for him,
The signs of the Cross shine for him in wars!

17. You defended his household with a zealous nose,
And embraced his widespread household with a spacious chest.

18. Straitened is he who heard injustice against him,
So excellent the martyr of tribulations!

19. Near is he to every distant horizon,
Far away from mentioning the Near Lord.

20. East and West have unveiled for him
Stars that orbit without setting,

21. Lights illuminated in the heaven of speech for him
Except the position of the Preacher.

22. And for him you bent the bow of struggle,
Spreading for it every piercing arrow.

23. You strung it to the hearts of enemies
And drowned in it the castings of suspicions.

24. So why are you distracted from a purpose like the morning,
Dawning on the horizons of dawn and dusk?

25. Smiling in the garden of my thoughts with my remembrance,
Flowers of light with pure lights.

26. So to God belongs the shining of that youth,
Gleaming in the beauty of those white hairs!

27. Thus the scent of this overwhelmed my loss,
As the rising of this overwhelmed my setting!

28. Those are the contradictions of my endeavor and bliss,
Calling: O most wondrous of wonders!

29. And those are the wares I strewed in prose and verse,
Wandering the land, is there any who would buy?

30. O people, is there any equal,
O records, is there any answer?

31. O my upbringing, servant of a sun,
And whom Hashim followed with succession!

32. No mark has surpassed what that Prince penned,
No noble has transcended what that Arab inscribed!

33. So is there in the earth besides an honest witness,
Each insightful heart responds to it?

34. And other than a truthful tongue of clarity,
Each unfounded claim admits it?

35. That before it, the kingdom of no ruler advanced
With a spark like the spark of Two Answering Kings.

36. So take pride in its inheritor from the King,
And be delighted in its inheritor from the Esteemed one!

37. And marvel at the most faithful King who lost
The most fulfilling share of mention and pride!

38. The banner of glory towering like the clouds' lightning,
To which the banner of wars rushes.

39. The good and sea are clothed with its mention
With every beauty and blessing.

40. Gardens of brilliant minds' blossoms
Wafting to the fruits of hearts.

41. Maidens sing of it in the rooms,
And masters challenge each other about it on the plains.

42. Grief and prairie flourished from it,
Drinking sins that erased my sins.

43. The deliverance of a life I shunned from it,
To the staff of the tent and narrow path!

44. As the flies seized the prey of eagles,
And the sparrows hunted ostriches,

45. So the strong overpowered the weak in these,
The claws of a lion, the fangs of a wolf!

46. Oppressions darkened the rights of the oppressed,
And doubts shone in the suspected.

47. You are the eyewitness to these,
And your judgement in them is obligatory.

48. Your promise bound me more than your offspring,
The union of the lover, and the watch of the keeper.

49. So when you opened with mighty victory,
Foretelling your near conquest,

50. You ascended the plateau of glory away from me,
And plunged me into a sloping dune.

51. The branches of bliss coiled around you below me,
And I was left roaming a barren plain.

52. You made it into a garden that never ceases
To be watered with ample thriving provision,

53. Which birds of joy do not stop populating,
Swaying on every fresh branch.

54. And if a breeze of its youth saddened me,
Relieving me with the breath of breezes,

55. I was led in thirst to sweet water,
Where the saliva of the beloved mixes.

56. How many of its leaves have I borne in the winds
To wipe in them the disgrace of miserable rags,

57. And wipe them on the cheeks of burning eyes,
My lasting irritation, wounds of my setting!

58. With what the enemies' arrows have ripped in them,
And what the humiliation of a stranger scratched!

59. So if they grew dim, little for an eye
Turning them with a gloomy heart's agony.

60. And if they sparked wildly in the thickets,
Embers for the fire of tribulations

61. Which the regrets of neglect kindle,
And the moans of weeping fan.

62. I endured some with beautiful patience,
And held back some with pouring tears,

63. To light from them the lamps of ember
Revealing to you the secret of the unseen.

64.
If your knowledge missed a thirsty sea,

65. Unquenched by drinking in gulps,
The withering of harvest in its withering

66. Would suffice you instead of doubting.
You suffice me, a noble and generous freeman,

67. Trustworthy in absence, treasuring the unseen.
I hope for a sick one, for curing illness,

68. A sick one certain of the healer's gift of wellbeing.
Good thoughts for true certainty

69. Are relatives, but not like a judicious relative.
So if you deny me, the most rightfully rewarded

70. Who appeals to nobilities, the most answering guide!
By that you would gain the most rewarded favor,

71. For which my praise will give the fullest reward.
He who denies the guest the breadth of shelter