1. What you knew and entrusted remains hidden,
Or has its rope when it came to you today, become unraveled?

2. Or did a veteran weep without fulfilling his tears
In yearning for loved ones on the day of separation intertwined?

3. I did not know about separation until they turned away frowning,
All beauties on the verge of dawn, wilted.

4. The maidens restored the beauty of life, so they endured,
As each was adorned with jewelry fastened.

5. Reason and sign, the birds follow them
As if made from the blood of intestines spilled.

6. They carry a perfume whose fragrance is diffused
As if its scent whiffs through the nose inhaled.

7. Like a musk pouch on their departure
For one extending his hand, it was sealed.

8. My eyes from me are as if a setting sun descends on them
Whose movement is tied down by firm ropes.

9. An era has been stripped bare until a broad sword unsheathed for it,
Like the edge of an unpolished sword, filed.

10. As if the washing of a scolder's mouth with its razor
On the cheek and on both chins, scratched.

11. The hair covering it has turned away while it embraces it
With pure dripping tar, greased.

12. It waters the sides of a pasture whose grass has withered
With running water from a cloudburst, flooded.

13. With the mention of Salma, my time for her mention is
Nothing but foolishness and guessing blindly shot.

14. The yellow shawls and the breastplate's clanking
As if fluttering noises inside the house sealed.

15. Will they meet me with the first of the people when they departed
Rough and unruly as the she-camels of Dhuhl uprooted?

16. It observes the whip slender and firm while bounding ahead
As the dodger of the whip stroke shied.

17. As if it is a dark-colored frightened whose legs
Were bent sideways for it with twisting and bending.

18. It remains in the meadow, the gnat pestering it
While the drowsiness it shook off was severed.

19. A mouth like the split of a staff, nothing makes it clear
Deaf to the voices, locked up.

20. Until it recalled eggs and was stirred
On a drizzly day, clouds looming.

21. So neither a burrow energizes its walk
Nor the whistling winds, ill-omened sounds.

22. Its blinking nearly disorders its gaze
As if it’s wary of the sly glances, suspected.

23. It comes to a ragged, frightened shelter whose pillars
Are as if they buzz when they kneel down.

24. Scattered like twigs of the shrub, its neck
Is as if a house surrounded by a dilapidated hyena, attacked.

25. It is shielded by a glowing, submissive hen
That answers it with melodies of cooing.

26. But every tribe, no matter how powerful and numerous,
Its leader is hit by the nails of evil, chased away.

27. And generosity negates wealth, destroying it
While stinginess keeps it for his family, and is blamed.

28. And wealth is fleeting comfort they play with
According to its scarcity, lasting and rolled up.

29. And praise cannot be bought except for its price
From what makes souls stingy, well known.

30. And ignorance has a reputation that cannot be bought back
While forbearance is a safe haven for people, lost.

31. And the food of sheep on the day of sheep is their food
However it turns, and the deprived are deprived.

32. And whoever confronts crows to scare them away
Is destined for misfortune upon his safety.

33. And every house, no matter how long it stands
Upon its pillars, is destined to crumble down.

34. I bear witness to their intoxicated drinking within them
While sober, and the people laid low by fatigue, worn out.

35. A cup of a dear one from grapes he liberated
For some of its owners, a picturesque tavern.

36. It alleviates headaches and its harshness does not harm you
Nor does accumulation in the head persist.

37. A tavern, an amphora whose years were not inaugurated
By a sealed decanter smeared with clay.

38. It remained flickering in the vat, slapped by
An non-Arabic boy in cotton garb, crumpled.

39. As if their pitcher is a young mountain goat on a hillside
Bloodied by the childhood of cotton garb, feeding on herbs.

40. Pure white prominent in the sun, its watcher
Imitating the rods of basil, aromatic.

41. I set out at the lead of the tribe, escorted
By one trusted for his goodness, marked.

42. And I ascended the camel litters that raised me
On a day the rain comes, poisonous.

43. Hot as if the fires’ flames envelop him
Without clothes, and the man’s head wrapped.

44. And I lead in front of the tribe a blaze
By which a lineage in the tribe is known.

45. Neither in its flames or embers is there fury
Nor have the windows, their carving, eroded it.

46. Smooth like the staff of a pleasure seeker, twisted by
One with spoils like seeds of carob, heaped up.

47. It pursues the slave girls when they are aroused by song
As if drums beating on camel litters, defeated.

48. Guided by it, the cheekiest of cheeks, an inspector
Of beauty, very fleshy, immoral.

49. When a corner of its tent ropes sways
The little humps bunch up at its corners, gathered.

50. And I accompany young men whose food
Is greens of food and meat with it, sliced up.

51. And I afford, when hunger befalls it
Followed by a drink from the spring of wine, fermented.

52. If only they would afford with horses I would afford thereby
And all the people's comforts are finite.