1. You spurned me when I sought you, though for you
I am a captive, abject in body and soul.

2. My looking away angered you, though in it
For me was loss and humiliation.

3. But I feared that the light of the sun observing us
Would be theft and shame on my part.

4. How could I gaze steadily
If my eyes met the sun?

5. Often you spurned me though I sinned not,
And after your spurning came frowning and sullenness.

6. Yet I did not complain of that, though you straitened
The earth for me until I felt it a prison.

7. O sun of the day, exalted in glory and age,
Sight and touch fall short of reaching you.

8. It is right that you set away from my pillow
Though sleep has been banished from me this five nights.

9. I hoped not tomorrow would bring you justice,
Else I should have said: Better than this was yesterday.

10. You frown at me and that is injustice,
And it is not lawful in Islam to act unjustly.

11. You obey the slanderers when they slander me
And most of their talk is raving and guesswork.

12. Many a slanderer has slandered me, bent on mischief,
Then slipped and his fortune was misery and overthrow.

13. I distinguish each thing in my affairs
Except my affair with you - in that is confusion.

14. For slanderers I do not shed precious blood,
And the value of all they say is a flea.

15. You planted a love - then tend it with care,
For a plant is not tended by neglecting it.