1. Except for you, sorrow. Surely I am a tormented lover
And I still sing of passion for you and become ecstatic!

2. You still remain for me an amazing fascination
That stirs my soul again and again!

3. And I still strive for the passion that carried us away -
Pleasures for which we neither complain nor suffer!

4. A life that leaned over and settled into
A terrifying pit, its fires blazing...

5. As for me... being hit was a painful
Devastating blow that makes the lion fold like a rabbit!

6. As for she who tormented me, she remained happy
In the misery of a heart that plays and frolics...

7. I wondered at her - she used to melt with juvenility
And sing of a rising love that has no setting!

8. Did she have false, deceitful love?
Was she but playing, attacking heedlessly, lying?!

9. Woe to her! She has persecuted, made lawful, and left,
While in my heart remains an ember burning from her.

10. Had I been guilty, my affliction would be upon me.
But am I ever anything but innocent!

11. Oh love, why do I have no escape from you yesterday
Oh love, why do I have no escape from you today?!

12. Both of them were difficult times, wrathful toward me
And of no use to avoid them!

13. I pretended to hide love from every critic -
Will it ever yield fruit or remain hidden?!

14. And a girl of beauty and chastity said,
Weighing them from afar with veil...

15. I knew she who loved and used to dominate -
She is a wolf and fox in greatness, pride and cunning!

16. She misled many, so she tyrannized and destroyed,
And nothing deters her from straying!

17. So I said: “Oh you, the Lord of a planet
And brightness, engulfed later by disappearance!”

18. She did not meet a compassionate heart, for it is cruelty,
Nor a firm heart, for it fluctuates!

19. Oh Lord of fertile beauty, its fruits
And flowers are a poison we drank from the scorpion!

20. If you tempt the infatuated when they incline toward you
To guide them, then you are no planet!

21. So she said: “Stop this nonsense! I surely
Come to him crazed in my kingdom and please him...!”

22. And in my eyes the beggar who humbles himself
Is equal to the lowly peasant whose whole world is trifles!

23. I make them both taste the bitterness of punishment – indignant
And smiling at what they face – and angry!

24. The conductor of havoc at my side is the claw,
Yet it is no fierce claw, and it is no claws!

25. Rather it is the little bird preyed on by its falcon -
Its sustenance from it is comfort...and drink!

26. Beauty is nothing but tyranny and aggression -
It is nothing but spoils and gain!

27. So for the frightened lover is a dissipated day,
And for the infatuated captive is a confusing day!

28. My spring is a spring with no autumn beyond it
Which I do not fear, and from which I do not shrink!

29. The days passed by us, their pillar collapsed,
And passion and enchantment no longer meet them!

30. Haughtiness, indignant and defiant, no longer benefits them -
The pastures and the Zainabs* have adorned them!

31. She wept and bowed weeping... Oh Lord, a tear
Flowed to heal its Lord when poured out!

32. And I glorified my Lord on that day, groveling before Him,
For I am laughing while she mourns!

33. Is this a myth...or reality?
Am I crazed in love...or experienced?!