1. Do I complain of the turns of fortune or blame my luck?
Yet who is not, at all times, a sufferer?

2. I am one wronged, without a judge; afflicted, without a sympathizer;
When he spends the night in his humble dwelling, he blames his luck, he blames his luck;

3. He meets sorrow in his heart at every course;
When it grows too narrow for him in the wide world.

4. Man is a creature of circumstance, Tossed about by the turning days,
Suffering the death pangs while time plays.

5. He was born into this world a partner of misery;
Neither his greed nor caution have saved him.

6. He keeps company with misfortune though she is his enemy.
What a pity that you befriend who brings you woe.

7. When the star of a man of honor is in decline,
His share of misfortune is not to be overcome.

8. He's a fugitive spending the night in the grip of a pursuer,
The quarry of time, to time who hunts him down.

9. While evil assails him from every side,
Lo! He's buried in a grave and hidden from view.

10. Oh life, how bitter are your days, Oh world,
The separation causes the crow of parting to caw in lament.

11. I've seen you to be pure deceit entirely,
In you no monks, and in you no sheltering places.

12. And even when the courses before me are straitened,
Still my breast for your deceits is more spacious.

13. Before me, from my torments and my patience both, wonders I see.
Most wondrous of all is my state and your states in relation.

14. Is there in you aught like separation from those loved
When that matter for which I sigh is past and done?

15. I've wept for them until I thought my weeping had been noticed
But when I wept and wailed none came or cared.

16. So many a night I have spent wakeful there,
The stars in heaven rising and then setting.

17. By the edge of the abandoned encampment lamenting in the darkness,
My companions the remains of dwellings; together we complain and lament.

18. Sparks of passion kindled by my recollection,
And quenched by the water of my tears mixed in.

19. I am determined not to wish for the death of my fervor,
To forbid my eyes to dry and my tears to run out.

20. For in my breast the heat of passion feels good,
And to me the shedding of tears is sweet and pleasant.

21. God has refused that I should incline to joy or,
Other than the voice of my weeping, chime or warble.

22. If the torment has tortured me before this passion,
After passion will there be no more torment?

23. Would that I knew! Will I see time unbend toward me,
Once, heedless of my sorrows, turn about?

24. Does it not have a day when its mysteries are clear,
Wherein tastes will be sweet and waters pleasant?

25. Or are the days quite done with me in enmity
And angered at me just as I am angered?

26. Long have I described its misfortunes without lying.
Oh would that it would strive toward me and I could accuse it falsely!

27. A curse upon it for the piercing arrows of its mischief,
And man derives no benefit from bewaring them.

28. Though lightning flashes, the calamity of its storms is certain
As for the lightning from it, that is deceptive and unsure.

29. The Iraqi poet Ahmad went before his time,
Reproaching it in his verse and chiding it.

30. But as for it being the dunya, if you wished to describe it
And I did not desire to write you could speak at length.

31. And if you provided me nothing but misfortunes,
How many claws has it rent me with until this day?

32. Mimicking the sea where a carcass floats up,
While precious pearls at the bottom sink down.

33. Missing therein are the fortunes of him who deserves them,
While the earnings are forbidden to him who toils.

34. And those who do not intend it gain its bounty,
While those who aim elsewhere are pierced by its arrows.

35. If what is right does not attend all equally,
Then the free man has in the wilderness no cause to celebrate.

36. And if what is clearly right lacks a helper,
Then the noble man is loathe to live, by your life.

37. If among us there is no party on the side of good,
Then it's miserable how you form parties around other things.

38. It will not avail the generous man for it to be spacious
If right within it is like money to be looted.

39. I almost broke down my lofty aspirations to establish it
And make it known in some matter though it remain veiled.

40. So it has remained from sight as if behind veils,
Hidden from view like a genie unseen.

41. I am among the people who, when their star fades,
Another star rises in brightness.

42. The elite, their ancestors nobilities have mixed,
Above insult from those from whom the generous sheikh descends.

43. They have lineage whose honor goes back to ancient roots
For them a station above the high heavens.

44. Their company graced by eloquence and protection,
A lavishing of enjoyments, a refined and cultured people.

45. Clothed when thoughts are covered in eggs,
As lions when thoughts are draped in white.

46. So he brings truth through eloquence and at other times,
The deaf fool's circle brought around.

47. Theirs is lineage that rivals suns in its brilliance,
Vying with the sun's shoulder, shoulder to shoulder.

48. Then if you trace back to them, these things are attributed
And ascend through them, the honorable virtues.

49. Without tracing a man back to glory and ascension,
By your life, mother and father avail him not.

50. As long as you live in the times, you are obligated
To rights among which are the most incumbent.

51. I care for great and lofty things, though beneath them,
Is keeping company with the slender necked westerner.

52. I see openings draw near whenever I am still,
And distance themselves whenever I draw near.

53. I left my heart distraught by passing misfortunes,
The heart most overturned by those occurrences.

54. Event after event has flowed through and they all
Leave an impression in the gentle heart.

55. But it avails not the patient man whenever
There is no refuge to be found from it in your life.

56. Mimicking the sea where scum rises to the top,
While the finest pearls at the bottom settle.

57. This then is the world, if you wish to describe it,
And if I do not desire to, then write on my behalf.

58. Even if you brought me nothing but unhappiness,
How many claws has it torn me with until this day?

59. I will thank it since when I was young,
It accustomed me to patience that became dear to me.