1. Darkness, who readied you for the nights?
And who but the virtuous extolled your favor?

2. O most trusted of trusts, prick up your ears,
To hear what vexes the exalted.

3. As for me, I assert compelling proofs
Of your glory in eloquent arguments.

4. You alone, for God's sake with gratitude,
Are known to friend and foe alike.

5. My praise is not fabricated,
Nor my depiction forged from fantasies.

6. To you beyond all people my pride clings,
From you my resolve and seclusion sprang.

7. The world has heard in every land
That vileness is no trait of mine.

8. When houses but Qusay's are named,
The family of Abi Uqayl is best.

9. You are their noblest kin and soul,
And strongest in honorable traits.

10. Your heights excel their gifts,
Your steadfastness surpasses theirs in strife.

11. Are you not the son of Munabbih, whose merits
Mark the worth of all men thereafter?

12. His abode remains hope's refuge,
His door where all journeys end.

13. To petitioners he rules with bounty.
Saving them from hands grasping and long.

14. Such plenty persists despite calamity,
Lasting through gratitude despite the plight.

15. You truly gained praise through merit,
A precursor, while your father trails behind.

16. Time has diseased me with every art,
And ceaseless ills allow no rest.

17. Loyalty in it grew so sparse
That right and left hand guard against each other.

18. All I possessed is lost,
And here am I, inflamed by poverty.

19. What little remained I gave a friend for safekeeping,
Exposing the remnants to ruin.

20. As if entrusting beauty to a lumbering camel,
Seeking smoothness from roughness personified.

21. So do not cling to ominous times,
Swift to change the hopeful's state.

22. In them, of good and evil, a little lingers,
Quick to pass, soon to decline.

23. A man has strayed, aspiring to subdue me,
Yet I accompany no people astray.

24. He who sought to provoke one such as I
Proceeded on a course his like proscribed.

25. That is a rule whose might revered ambition,
Never occurring to the unjust of mind.

26. The Lord of the Throne sustained Christian monks,
Blessed them from asceticism's spring.

27. They refused no deposits by their keepers,
For any kind of questionable gain.

28. Nor did they clench fists over them,
To seize through lawsuit and contention.

29. I wrote him gently dissuading,
But he ignored any words or deeds,

30. Read no Scripture, nor any book,
By which the lawful is known from forbidden.

31. I named him not, to keep affection,
But asked him not, nor he me.

32. If intimacy among men today is like love
Between lizard and wall, what of it?

33. When his flood surged, pouring generosity,
He turned to excuses and delays.

34. So he gained by weakness what timidity lost,
Closing off my path of patience and endurance.

35. While you, if any foe attacks my arms,
Are an unassailable fortress, though fate assails me.

36. Your command permeates us, so deliver
My due, for justice' sake untainted.

37. You do not tire of even justice among disputants,
Nor lean to one side, nor favor.

38. Oh how time has vilified me, for what it did,
To this wretched state and bitter end!

39. And the days made light of my status and plenty,
Deeming my praises cheaper than all that's cheap.

40. The generous are gone, guarding my face,
With what they spent safe from vile begging.

41. Now after them among the people I seek
A generous one to buy my gratitude with wealth.

42. I see the base shining bright, their drinkers beaming.
While my gleam from pure water is denied.

43. Perhaps, son of Abdullah, you will heed
Long affection, or lament my state,

44. And not withhold your bounty from a loyal one,
To you, and spreading your superior merit.

45. In both withholding and giving
I am thankful, in any case.

46. Why speak more of my injustice?
One like you inclines not to the absurd.

47. My affair is clear, not opaque, though your father's is,
So I attribute it to the injustice of time.

48. If it weren't for want, that grew and raged,
I'd have shielded your loftiness from this talk.

49. I will reluctantly leave this land,
Not by choice, and abandon its people.

50. In a state, if my enemy but saw it,
He would grieve for me, or mourn me.

51. So provide me with sufficient provisions
To be talked of in Iraq and Syria alike.

52. For I have been impoverished of camels and speech,
While you are more generous than Bilal.

53. May God, to whom in your protection is my plea,
Grant you enduring supremacy and triumph!