1. The wind carried his greetings,
And lightning lent its flashes his passion.

2. So the former flowed with ease, while the latter
Ignited in its clouds its darkness' heat.

3. In both he saw the features of a Hindi maiden:
A sweet dispersal that wandered, and the beauty of her smile.

4. A singing gazelle who seduces hearts with a glance -
Hearts cannot wish safety from her.

5. I am a lover intoxicated with her company,
While she, estranged, is a gazelle intoxicated.

6. How strange that I complain of distance from her,
When she is a meadow doe who has made my heart her pasture.

7. O you who have distanced yourself from me,
Rarely has blame clung to me.

8. For she who cured me with her love,
And captivated my heart with her glances, is sick.

9. Obstacles stand between us, while she hopes
For a messenger uncomplaining of fatigue.

10. O clouds, if you pass by Tihama,
Quench the valley of al-Ghadha and revive its tents.

11. And stay a while in a wooded glade,
After despair of your remembering its days.

12. A relic whose tears I wept long, until I watered
Its bald hills and stony ground with my tears.

13. Spacious of error the path ran and ran;
And the rain ran to its goal and became its imam.

14. He departed it, knowing that the most precious
In rank and office have preceded him.

15. The excellent, the noble place, the unmatched lord,
They and the guiding scholar rose above them.

16. The bountiful embarked upon it as a creed, establishing it,
And subjected to us through it his rulings.

17. He strove, so built of glory a house,
Attaining in it by resolve what he desired.

18. God ordained that despite enviers you shall not
Perish until the Day of Resurrection.

19. Where the wind of your well-being for virtue blows
From a raincloud of your comfort its treasures.

20. Indeed we have seen in al-Malik al-Nasir
The full moon and the pouring rain and lightning flash.

21. We accompanied him a while as though we accompanied
A glittering star and its decisive setting.

22. His pens whispered; we heard
The utterance of Suhban in the eloquence of the ancients,

23. With subtle, delicate meanings that showed
The delight of a garden in the limpidity of wine.

24. Whenever his opponent's hearing was greeted,
It lowered his worth and speech.

25. When the horses raged in battle
And stirred up clouds of dust,

26. Time raced swimmingly; destinies leapt up, swords unsheathed,
And good fortune donned its armor.

27. When he gave generously, I said: "Hatem al-Ta'i;"
When he was valiant, I said: "Ka'b ibn Mamah."

28. O Abu l-Qasim the distributor of destruction to the envious
And safety to the loyal,

29. Be prosperous, for you are a generous patron -
May God accept your ritual purity and fasting.