1. I grew weary of poetry and said, "Enough!
For something whose strength is weakened by frailty.

2. I try to insert a jest in every verse,
But that is often beyond my ability.

3. The essence of poetry is what a verse contains
Of strangeness of jest or kind of wit.

4. Wretched is the verse that contains before you
Naught but walls and a ceiling.

5. I saw poetry as being partly like an affliction upon the ear,
And partly like scratches.

6. And above poetry the people vary so much
That you see one as weak above weakness.

7. When the prince comes forth, you would think him
Like the rest of the people when he first appears to your eye.

8. And how would you know how many men he equals
If you aligned a row after row with him?

9. In every issue we see disagreement
Except in acknowledging his superiority in every description.

10. And is there any disagreement among people in the morning
That some of them affirm it and some deny it?

11. The hearts of the people came together unanimously
Upon him, and unanimously agreed without any dissent.

12. So there was no word of denial for disagreement
Nor any word of conjunction for accord.

13. The authority of the guardian of truth is sanctioned
In law and convention.

14. For one whom, if parted from, would weep and yearn
With the longing of intimacy upon the parting of an intimate.

15. Sincere of heart, of upright action,
Governs without disability or omission.

16. For him is ancient glory
With generations firmly saddlebagged, one behind the next.

17. I say, when I finish praising him,
I have exhausted from him every letter.

18. And I turn back, when I turn back, as if
I realized one out of a thousand.

19. I am his servant; through that I raise my head high,
While for enviers there is only choking gall.

20. I was his as an ancestral inheritance,
But became his afresh as an endowment.

21. I rave in mentioning him, intoxicated, as if—
God forbid—tipsy with wine.

22. And I race the winds to him until
I travel before them and they travel behind me.

23. God established his dynasty, and so it was
Like the light of the full moon when gloom is dispelled.

24. We shared in its prosperity, but still
My portion was above half.