1. I always find you, my thoughts ever flowing to Zainab
An apparition, when darkness falls, cloaking itself

2. It traveled from the heights of Syria, fate drawing it here
Borne on the breeze from the gardens, brought by the zephyr

3. And it never visited save my heart was captivated
To it, else I'd say, welcome and greetings

4. And my night of anguish became overburdened
Showing me the gait of steps, the bounty of youth

5. It shone in the moonlight, while the moon was rising
And it took the moon's place when it disappeared

6. If it were real, it wouldn't have come to extinguish
My torment, or take my captive self away

7. I knew if you made a tryst, you made one binding
Vehemently, and if you flashed, you flashed alluring

8. I used to think the aloofness that passed
Was coquetry - but it turned out to be avoidance

9. Oh my regret that I ask the withholder
And believe the betrayer and reproach the offender

10. I will restrain my heart from you or follow desire
To you, if my heart refuses or declines

11. I say to a band of riders armed
Upon steeds slicing through the night

12. Return the conqueror Bin Khāqān, he
Most noble among you and nearest your goal

13. He is the lofty, brilliant, his generosity verdant
And the edges of his lightning blaze

14. When he clashed in battle’s fury, he overwhelmed the foe
And when he surged in the melee, he flooded the plain

15. Dignified, when the people’s resolves weakened
And composed when the blows of fate intensified

16. Your life: to meet you pleased with munificence
And your death: to meet you wrathful in valor

17. Harūn - when you back him in adversity
And if you approach him in lowliness, accompany

18. A man whose demeanor never lost resolve
Nor spent his time watching the rear of events

19. When he intended, weakness did not detain him
And if he stopped, being overwhelmed did not drive him away

20. He was lent hearts’ affection and his
Hands were given power over enemies, vanquishing

21. And we deemed the turns of fate maintained by souls
That revere you, not begrudging mother or father

22. So you never lacked merit to attain what
You sought, nor judgment to show you the hidden

23. The envious blamed you only for nobility
Before you and refined, gentle deeds

24. And yesterday they tested your resolve
With which you outdid the peerless, well-honed sword

25. On the morrow, you met the lion, the lion groggy
Honing fangs for the meeting and unsheathing claws

26. A fortress on the Nayzak River protects it
Impregnable, its thicket towering and thick

27. It descends to caves in the hills, denning
And it camps in meadows on the plains, grazing

28. There it plays with speckled partridges
Spying and stalking francolins by the water

29. When it pleases, it roams the wilderness or attacks
Herds of deer, or hunts a fleeing hare

30. It drags to its cubs every dawn
Prey - bleeding, prone - or a bloody gazelle

31. And he who unjustly covets your sanctuary leaves
Destroyed or dejected, disappointed

32. I witnessed - when you leapt up to face him
Whetting for him a blade of Indian steel, tempered

33. I did not see any pair as loyal as you two
Wrestling, when cowardice the visage belies

34. Braggart walked seeking braggart and overcome
The overcomer, pale of face, overwhelmed

35. He blundered into strife but was halted by a charge
Seeing you its most resolute lion, and most defiant

36. So he recoiled when he found no gain in you
And advanced when he found no escape from you

37. It did not avail him to wheel around toward you
Nor rescue him to shy away from you

38. You set upon him with the sword, your resolve unwavering
Your hand not falling back, its edge never dulling

39. And when you brought both arms together you would rend
Armor - leaving naught for the sword to strike

40. You softened for me the days after harshness
And chastised my unkind fate until it made amends

41. You clothed me in bounty that changed my
Brother’s attitude to me - foreign, estranged

42. So I gained no respite from the bitterness of nights
Save I woke thanking you, unremitting

43. Though the strings of lyrical composition are guarantees
For thanking you - no darkness dispelled a star

44. Praise that scours the lands - open and desolate -
And the caravans took with them, east and west