1. The night has spread and the dark of night is a veil upon the wanderer
As the guide marched through the plain of Dhi Qar

2. Where the neighing of the wild ass or the mountain goat echoes
Swaying their necks and bellowing in their pens

3. A caravan of Quraish was beset
By the heels of the departed and the wrists of journeys

4. So she said, having bitten us in wonder:
White she-camels of fragrant saddlebags

5. May God water and pasture Muawiya
He is the raincloud of continual glory between ruins

6. And I am content with what fancy has wished
Even if the chosen one has no share in that

7. My chastity while awake is the trait of the glorious
And drowsiness has drawn him in, the guile of the treacherous

8. The full moon and the night spread out
Over the bend of the valley, the lights of fires

9. I ransom him from one who travels by night as a raider
And I lull him from a specter wandering in the distance

10. So greet him for me every evening and dawn
As the singing women flow with melodies

11. When thunder roars through it, clothing is worn
And lightning flashes with the bare spear

12. Yet Salma's people barred her meeting
Men who fear dishonor wade into evil

13. Whenever I visit her, I find near her tent
A disheveled guard protecting the household with a spear

14. How often she crept up on us, walking stealthily
Between help and virgins in the darkness of night

15. When they saw the night had blackened its branches
They turned back, with no garment dirtied by hems

16. He walked away, his skirts sagging as if
The moist breeze had clothed him in the softness of dawn

17. While they dragged their trains on the ground
Fearing the living would notice their tracks

18. Of what the leaves have spread in secret, whenever
I inclined my ear, it whispered my mysteries

19. When she sighed, doves responded
As passion moaned through the thickets

20. As if my messengers had taught them my words
So when they cooed, they recited my verses

21. The rhymes came to you, O son of ‘Amr, though you never
Rejected the praise of the heavy with slumber

22. And you gave us blessings, like a garden embraced
By the breeze of morning, before the rains

23. Your hands reap the praise in every abode
Leaning with ears and sights toward you

24. You who trimmed the claws of sedition
That scraped at us with fangs and claws

25. And the battle beneath the caliphate you joined
With the resolve of unyielding warriors

26. When war adorns its arena with the son of Hurrah
Awe-inspiring, foremost with the cheekpieces shaking

27. Brandishing to the right, unfurling no darkness
With his sword but that of entrails and veins

28. The shepherd of hostility will know you strike
With a flint that sparks off its embers

29. Better than he desires is the withdrawer
Of spear shafts into the hateful shattered

30. When the glorious light darkens its horizon
It is clothed by the Tamim branch with moons

31. The enemy dreads them when they appear
Upon every clashing coat of mail

32. With every tall far reaching
Squanderer of wealth and plunderer of lives

33. They repel the rear of clouds with faces
That rise with the chains of youth, free

34. While you, if the branch differs from its origin
Resemble your father, Qaram, son of Suwar

35. Three times the flowers of youth are culled by you
With glories, in peace high reaching, in war hurtful

36. When you determine opinion, its ruse sheathes
The prey, every creature bound by its fetter pulls

37. You issue what you import, and judgment extends
Your hands, no issue but by export

38. And when faces of tribes turned from us
Who bar the buyer from guest and neighbor

39. You raised for us the fire of villages after
Others besides you failed, honored lighter of flames

40. While others hushed their voices in the dark
And the guests felt shame in asking for bounty

41. So no glory but what you contained, and others built
High, yet upon crumbling ruin

42. By God, your selection let no spring flow
To a west where the wind twists the hollow

43. In horses what a winker has not tried
Refuses cover by any racecourse

44. So turn from the treacherous wolf whose betrayal spread
And feel secure only near the biting wolf