1. No secret of his did any supplicant hear
Until his tongue of tears was struck dumb

2. And events have their own events in relating them
You know them, so give release or withhold

3. A watcher returned, after innocence, crestfallen
On account of the full moon's, not the crescent's, eclipse

4. Did I not tell you not to attack by surprise?
I fear for you the muddling of the vile and the noble

5. By stealth, after long despair, I slipped away
From one whose charms are sweeter than thefts

6. From a fawn-eyed one, my cheek's constant friend, so gentle
That the sword has not feared his neighborhood, being unguarded

7. Arriving at union, avoiding it, mingled therein
As if coupled with him in softness and trampling

8. He disobeyed me, so let him not forget me; I'll remember him
I remembered him to God, between us, but he forgot

9. I see misfortunes pregnant wherever they are born
And the son of misfortunes is an orphan in Tripoli

10. You who nearly stoned me in a verdant valley
Yesterday in a gray one of affliction

11. You brought him down in a precinct not yet digested
O father of Hussein and unstinted provision

12. You are of a party whose glories have furnished
Much occupation for pens and tablets

13. You ascend and draw near as their natures ascend
Like suns, but not being the sun

14. Long have they risen out of the fire of their resolve
Meteors, and many a meteor unlit

15. Their very selves refuse to halt for necessities
Until they wish their spirit could dispense with breath

16. A glory you rode, the lion of the lair, and yet
You distinguished not its roar from the whinny of a mare

17. Your throne endured upon auspicious, lofty aid
The lofty fortress, protecting them from that guard