1. Hope has waned, so what will rouse you, O dwelling of Ma'rib?
The singers have left, so what will stir you, O maker of music?

2. The sun of time, so it does not soften, and sometimes
The boy takes the reins, playing.

3. And I see raging misfortunes after what
Their outbursts have been suppressed, controlled and avoided

4. On the savage side of them a high road
That cannot be managed, and a firm wall that cannot be toppled

5. They have unleashed their torrents on a worn-out people
Who have become accustomed to humiliation, dragged and pulled about

6. Who knew adversity in its beginnings and knew it
As an old man, bending over his hands and becoming humpbacked

7. And though he enjoyed the freshness of youth, he did not enjoy
The ignorance of a twenty-year-old frolicking about

8. Wake, O old age, how can a broken nation frolic
Feeble, defeated, and a grey-haired people?

9. It hopes and aspires while life is harsh
Its windows pass and determination labors

10. Push yourself forward, do not be intimidated
None among nations have honor who are intimidated

11. The weakness of a young man is in his supposition and hope
Supposition disappoints and hope is deceived

12. The nobility and pride of life belong to the risk-taker
Who goes forth, neither twisting nor turning back

13. Set out the life for your nation, let
Nothing in your life be a preoccupation other than that

14. No nations have known a right or a duty
Except that serving it is more right and obligatory

15. If you wished, none would reproach you, and no homeland
Whose good you had marred would be tortured

16. The seeker of requests and hopes is devastated
Never ceasing to be struck by disasters and defeated

17. The hand of events throws him down in terror
Punishment has afflicted him while you are the guilty one

18. Do you have any remnant in yourself to preserve
To protect that remnant from a life that is despoiled?

19. The steadfast ones who were saviors of a nation have gone
Adversity has befallen it and the path has narrowed

20. The turns of fate have shattered its hope
And it has fallen while fickle time overturns it

21. Its own fingers have failed and though its arm has been helped
That arm has betrayed the shoulder

22. The time's own calamities have taken away its light
With how they resent its guides and incite against them

23. At every bright rising and setting
A moon passes away and a bright star sets

24. Its righteous children were scorned and were wronged
And it wanders terrified, crying and lamenting

25. Disasters take pleasure in the gurgling of its blood
To the point of excess bitterness and torment

26. Nothing remains of it but a submissive weakling
Its predators and wild beasts crowd around it

27. It calls out for its protecting supporters, but below them
There is a gaping mouth from which support and claws are absent

28. The carefree one sleeps, unaware of its affliction,
While an exhausted heart refuses me sleep

29. Hearts find their consolation, and its consolation
Has weakened, deficient in what is sought and desired

30. I consoled it, but it refused while there is no doubt
That another betrays, and another harbors suspicion

31. While I am the loyal one, when the betrayer changes
The worst of men is the inconstant betrayer

32. I do not know, when the darkness gathered, was it a burning thirst
Among the gravel, or a venomous snake that creeps about?

33. In my heart, from the anguish of worries, is an expert
In the past and hated misfortunes, a recorder

34. Say to the horsemen, the swordsmen, and the young gazelles
Worry is the most piercing stab in hearts and the most penetrating

35. If it flew in the air from the hand of a caster
Iron would melt from it, and flocks take fright

36. War turns away its violence from its frenzies
And the unflinching warrior shrinks from its flood

37. War is not an encounter in which the young man falls
War is that which makes souls miserable and erects

38. The shadows of peace have lied - how many who bid farewell
Hope in them that if they are struck they will be mended

39. Life in the shadow of worries is not beneficial
Death is more beneficial for the grieved and more wholesome

40. Fear of death, when life is hateful
Is nearest to the hopes of souls and most fitting

41. My stance on life and love of it is the nobility with which
I am distinguished and made most wondrous

42. My soul and what my hands possess belong to my nation
And the honorable ancestors from whom I originate

43. I taught them love of country as innate
While those with protective charms listen as I speak

44. May Solomon the Blessed fulfil its due
And al-Radhiyya Zaynab preserve its sanctity

45. My son, you belong to the country and it
Belongs to you, after your father, as worthy inheritance

46. Roll up your sleeves if you are called to its victory
The generous man is indeed called to such

47. And if you are tested by an ignorant one who insults it
Say: death is preferable to that, a ship

48. Stop! My most precious homeland is no merchandise
To be bartered, nor are my people goods to be imported

49. Restrain yourself, for it is merely a deal
The generous man is insulted and stripped for it

50. No adversity in affairs has afflicted a person
Except that this is more adverse and difficult than it

51. And indeed I have seen among wonders enough
That what you wished for yourself would be most wondrous

52. Shall I sell the bone of my father and flesh of my tribe?
Glory is angered and manliness reproached

53. When the deluded young man sells his homeland
Wealth is from his enemies, and position

54. A man is nothing but his nation and homeland
So look at which homelands you will be attributed

55. And ask the echoes of tombs, for they
Make clear the meaning of life and explain

56. Indeed the dead are proud of its soil
And a country's earth is beloved to souls

57. Zeal for men is no disgrace
The generous man has zeal for his nation

58. Accustom your children to goodness, for their souls
Are pages on which your right hand writes what it wills

59. Children have no traits but those
A mother established for them, and a father bequeathed

60. A person has from his clan's nobility a deterrent
And from good traits a nurturer

61. And for each soul in life there is its path
And its share of what it earns and acquires

62. Among the favors of history is that its account
Is truth, and its decree cannot be rejected

63. People stand under the banner of its justice
So the scale of rights is erected and set up

64. In a majestic stand, its masses surge
And the crowned and the turbaned are trampled

65. It ruled time, so no era has a refuge
That will protect it from Him, nor does a generation have an escape

66. Truths were obscured for a period, then arose
And dawned, and the unseen responded to it

67. O Nile, few are enshrouded in you
Would that thirst be the lot of one who betrays you as drink

68. Does a traitor violate your covenant, including it
Between your two banks, in a fertile valley?

69. He killed loyalty, yet you were not angry, but rather
He who envies and rages protects the truth

70. You grant life to him, yet there is no life for a killer
In your rule, that can be granted

71. You have infatuated souls with treachery and deceived them
With a hope that dupes them and a delusive mirage

72. None remains to protect the truth after
The firmest of protectors has been weakened

73. Send me the remedies of nations, for I
Am a physician experienced in the remedies of nations

74. When nations' stagnancy continues, degeneration lingers around them
There is no cure for a nation

75. Until division and partisanship are gone
Who will give me a people in experience, not the strong

76. Splitting from it, nor desire branching into it
United, seeking life as if it is

77. An army pouncing on its enemies
God determines the lives of nations

78. And protects them from what they fear and dread
And when He decides on an affair, then for His decree

79. Among kingdoms and nations there is no rescinder
Where are the working men? For it is only

80. Through men that kingdoms last and pass away