1. I have a servant I still hold accountable
He is absent until his negligence takes him back

2. We send him to buy fruit
Yet for our palace to get his books is rare

3. How many times did my guest say when I sent him
Alas! On the Day of Judgement his state!

4. And I left him, he set out to a vineyard
As if so he could pick grapes for himself

5. He just visited an owner and saw
Dates of honesty so he kept selecting them

6. Then he came to me and my anger at him
And the guest's anger had multiplied

7. So he said here you are and he had in his hand
Nothing but pits that their dates had once filled

8. Or sour pomegranate and its peel
With no water, strange are his wits!

9. He got lost so he cannot find his way to goodness
As if we had tasked him with gathering firewood

10. His absence is endless and his failure
Does not cease or his defect makes it continue

11. He delays until I almost reckon
He met a billy-goat so it kept milking him

12. Or the high road impeded his need
Or he met an aroused furious lion

13. Or a powerful warrior's fists struck him
Or he fell off the mount he rode

14. Did he buy and the fortunate is its seller?
Did he meet and the fortunate is who he gave to him?

15. He did evil with the Muslims who tasked him
He was neither a tasker nor did his task