1. From the abode of mortality seeking eternity
Or is loyalty hoped for from time?

2. Or how can the world’s deceit be trusted
When the elite and the noble are tempted by it

3. Evil is the abode though its surface is pure
Its pleasure is disease, I swear by my life

4. It smiled in your face so you were deceived
Undoubtedly, it was a mocking smile of derision

5. Where are the great ones and the powerful titans
The kings of hunt and princes of authority

6. Where is the truthful, honest, veracious
Whose nature perplexed opinions

7. The guide of righteousness, the insignificant yet content
Whose merit even enemies don’t deny

8. The beacon of scholars, the master of all
To whom even the virtuous submitted

9. The one who suppressed rage, whose trait
Was always clemency and pardoning

10. Who taught people loyalty, and how much
Did he repay harm with kindness

11. He never showed us except sincere affection
And loyalty despite his afflictions

12. He is the pride of the proud, and with him
His noble ancestors took pride

13. Zayd is exalted in his pride like
The lofty peaks are raised in their loftiness

14. Honored with him more than a master who ruled the world
And the great bowed to his greatness

15. Gifted by Allah with knowledge, adorned with
Piety, good morals, and modesty

16. With a prophetic nature, and an Alid distinction
And protective zeal, integrity and excellence

17. And eloquence that leaves Sa’sa’ah and Wael
Behind, and renders them inarticulate

18. And rhetoric before which minds stand perplexed
And before which orators are struck dumb

19. O scholars, why are you silent like shepherds
Who have lost their flocks and have no shepherd

20. Do you not realize when your leader passed away
And the virtuous were orphaned by his loss?

21. Are you not aware that the hand of death has seized him
Would that it had withered instead!

22. The valleys of dew are ever gloomy
And the quarters of generosity now desolate

23. Gloomy are the valleys that once shone
With the dawn of his face dispelling sorrows

24. Gloomy are the valleys where ruin once cowered
Melting away when his name was mentioned

25. The scholars are now orphaned as when
He passed away, so were the destitute

26. Let eternal glory mourn its companion
And let its match, sublimity, weep

27. I cannot forget when the greatest bore his bier
Wailing and crying around it

28. The elite dismounted in reverence
As they do before their like

29. Had he not been the crown of glory
The leaders would not have borne him aloft

30. Wondrous it was to see a towering mountain carried
Nearly shaking the dust in its sorrow

31. But when he was laid to rest in its belly
It calmed, and things rested above it

32. Does it behove the dust's communicator to host
A lofty spirit the asterisms envy?

33. O you who left but did not depart from us
Though the assemblies and gatherings are devoid of you

34. Yours was not an ordinary day - in every heart
Is anguish and agony for you

35. After you, life holds no good - verily it is
Wretched, so bid life farewell!

36. If the dead were like you, they would never
Be deemed inferior to the living

37. You were a light that vanished, so the moon of darkness wept for it
And Canopus cries in lamentation

38. Those schools turned gloomy without him
Though your sun lit them for so long

39. The paths of guidance are darkened, and for how long
Did the dawn of your face reveal them

40. The world turned black around us without him
And the horizons darkened, green and dusty

41. The schools weep, desolate without him
As do knowledge, books, and the lofty

42. The prayer niche weeps, and how much did it
Echo at dawn with his weeping

43. The least that eyes should do is overflow
With tears, and rend garments for one like him

44. Souls should pour with grief, livers and guts
Should split and tear

45. One whose deeds have not died cannot die
His memory makes the air fragrant

46. No, I know not what remains for him
That I may elevate to the Most High, O Noble One

47. We hope the One whose illustrious
Ancestors founded generosity

48. Will also guard the neighbor of Him who guards neighbors
Or else one fears intercession of blameless fathers

49. Or dreads the agony of judgement - behold, in the protection
Of the Prince of Believers is shelter for him

50. For him is a station in the highest gardens of Paradise
Whereat enemies will envy him

51. Honored with the finest dwelling beyond which there is no
Beyond - there is no beyond that Beyond

52. If Fatima witnessed the day of his death
She would have donned mourning clothes for him

53. She was devastated by his loss, and for so long
The poets prided themselves on praising him

54. The dead vied in glorifying him, and how much
Did the living pride themselves in him!

55. On the morrow when his calamity spread
The sincere scholars' turbans unraveled