1. I returned to Lebanon after a long absence
And descended into the expanse of its courtyard humbly

2. I walked around trying to recapture my lost youth
With profit or loss, all in vain

3. I found the prime of beauty, though I did not ask
If I had wasted the prime of my youth in vain

4. And I found in the merriment of life my childhood
And my youth and my maturity equal

5. And I broke the bond between me and calamities
And took safety from the tyranny of time

6. And I put a barrier between my today and yesterday
And built a dam between us called forgetfulness

7. And I sought the help of my muse and found her
Generous, bestowing her goodness as an ally

8. And I spurred the sleeping rhymes but did not find
Among the dormant, a racecourse for poetry

9. The drought came up with its excuse and its thirst
While the fertile mountains flowed with softness and bendiness

10. And I showed it “Hamma”, where it saw
An angel extending poetry, not a devil

11. And I wanted it to describe life gently
And nobly, and master it perfectly

12. But it complained to me in a language whose letters
Were too narrow to articulate prose and verse

13. "Shaghour Hamma" did not see a paradise
Who did not behold “Hamma” at least once

14. A meadow that nature wanted as a portrait
Of its creativity and marvel

15. So it made it with all the finest pleasures
And showered it with the colors of its beauty

16. Carefully selected from the natural life
And the most sublime place from all the countries

17. With its streams, whose shadows are from rippling
That heals hearts and cools the thirsty

18. And its deep valleys, its springs, its plains
And its mountains, and its blossoming prairies

19. And its flooded meadows in abundant greenery
Diffusing the aroma of flowers and basil

20. A valley grew snaking between the mountains
And there it was, embraced with affection

21. And there were its waters and trees
Come to surround its meadow with orchards

22. Look at the silent mountain, proud
With its crops and fields so lush

23. Touching certainty with doubt, it shook
The mirror of a soul seeking faith

24. Is it from paradise, and its wine? For you it's an image
Through which paradise portrayed its paradise

25. I returned to your water, drinking, and reckoned
I returned after abstinence to addiction

26. O sister "never twice", refine your atmosphere
And soften perception and sentiment

27. These sweet springs gushed forth
From which springs of rhetoric gushed goodness

28. The eternal, eternalizing your sun’s radiance
And the sublime, sublimating the loftiness of your plateau

29. And the inspiring, evoking from emotions the best
Of intimacy, and the most subtle of sorrows

30. An inspiration descended, and the dew, a message
That came down while the stars glittered together

31. In a divine moment with its thrills
The painters flourished and the eras excelled

32. O river, whose murmur awakened
The ages to its melodious chant

33. O awe-inspiring silent mountain
Contemplating, drawing from the universe

34. O tree, whose rustling fulfilled
Life and its light thankfully

35. It does no harm that you have no tongue
You are most eloquent in logic and rhetoric

36. “Shaghour Hamma” stirred with his charm
The peaks of mountains and swayed the valleys

37. The deaf rocks spread their hems
And opened up their bosoms as harbors

38. He walked upon them, pacing their terrain
Eagerly to its currents impetuously

39. The banks of the shore sang proudly with him
And the barren land blossomed beautifully with him

40. He dressed the plants with a brilliance they never had
And the freshness of his brook sparkled to the branches

41. And the shining pebbles in their murmur
Gleamed like round pearls, embellished and abundant

42. He left the naked, roaring mountains
And embodied the trees and branches

43. And imagination threw with his beauty's miracle
Clothing his state which was bare

44. And nightingales greeted him on the banks
Cheerfully singing like him cheerfully

45. Twisting, giving you in his twists
Lost between the paths, confused

46. The sun cast upon him a faint light
The shades were adorned, delicate and lively

47. And he turned back in the afternoon gloomy
Like dawn, heralding clamorfully

48. I penetrated his woods as if I
Became for the first time an artist

49. And as if I, as I try, am fleeing
Cautious, fearing that a human might see me

50. And I found myself and nature forgetting
What the two worlds contained except us two

51. And I cast aside the burdens of ambitions
And found in their deceptions tranquility

52. And deemed myself a bird playing with its shadow
In the water, enjoying rest and safety

53. And my soul surrendered to the dreams of youth
And touched the specter of its imagination awake

54. And I mixed memories into a blend
And found myself blissful, distressed

55. And the images of realities slipped despite me
Once, evoking sorrows

56. And imagination purely shone radiant
While reality extinguished the glow