1. Poets of Egypt, I do not mean all of you
Why have you become the torment of your people?

2. Did merciful Egypt sin, so the best of you
Remain silent and disgrace marks all of you?

3. O you who support injustice without hesitation
Changing with the diversity of your forms

4. You did not invoke art in your deeds
And art has been choked by the stigma of your actions

5. Corruption has spread and you are its aides
To it is the return of your rising or setting

6. You boycotted me and deemed my watering unlawful
As if I had not been a chanter of your words

7. Rather, I continued singing to you
That I am aloof from the baseness of your disgrace

8. Why the pretentiousness with the loftiness of your poetry
When it is selling out to those you fancied before

9. Do not consider writers more contemptible than you
Their example is inspired by the likes of you

10. When you swim displaying it, the whale
Overturned the ship playfully around you

11. Oh what promiscuity and dishonor your display has become
It has become hostage to your cowardice and ignorance

12. And if I am insulted in my exile
It is an honor conferred by a sign of your nobility