مقسم الخاطر ولهانه — Abn Nbath

مقسّم الخاطر ولهانه

مخبرٌ عن شانهِ شانه

His lovesick self is distracted in thought;

his disfigurement speaks of his state.

تكلمت مهجته بالأسى

وعبرت بالحال أجفانه

His heart spoke with sorrow,

and his eyelids expressed his plight.

بالروحِ أفدِي أغيداً قد بدا

يخطُّ فوق الخدِّ ريحانه

With my soul I ransom a graceful youth who has begun

to trace his basil upon his cheek.

عادٍ على نوم الورى ناهبٌ

وهو ثقيل الجفن وسنانه

A plundering assailant of people's sleep,

though he is heavy-lidded and drowsy.

يحمي شقيق الروض في خدِّه

وبالقنا يحجب نعمانه

He guards the garden's anemone upon his cheek,

and with spears shields his anemone.

واهاً له خدًّا حكى جنةً

وخاله الأسود جنَّانه

Ah, his cheek, resembling a paradise,

with his black mole as its gardener!

أضحى معاذاً من سلوّي فما

يزال يضني القلبَ فتَّانه

He has become immune to my forgetting; never

does the heart's enchanter cease to waste it.

يا واعداً من بُعدِه بالردى

يكفي من الواعد هجرانه

O you who promise death through your distance,

the promiser's abandonment is enough.

تجني بساتين البرايا وقد

جنى على رآئيك بستانه

The gardens of humankind are harvested, yet

his garden has harmed whoever beholds you.

وعاذل مقلته لا ترى

والصبّ لا تسمع آذانه

And a reproacher whose eye cannot see,

while the lover's ears cannot hear.

يجهل جهل الثور في عذله

فخلّه يطلقُ فدَّانه

He is ignorant as an ox in his reproaches;

so leave him to loose his ox-team.

ما أكتم القلب لتبريحه

وقد توارت منه نيرانه

How secretive the heart is about its torment,

with its fires hidden from view.

قلبت يا قلبي زنداً فما

يضره للنارِ كتمانه

You have become, my heart, a firestick; for

concealing its fire does it no harm.

إن كان حزني من رضاها جرى

فمن سرور القلب أحزانه

If my sorrow arose from her pleasure,

then the heart's sorrows are part of its joy.

وجيرة في القلب أسكنتهم

فارتحل البيت وسكانه

And neighbors whom I lodged within my heart—

the house departed with its inhabitants.

وأصبح المغرم قد فاته

مكانه منهم وإمكانه

And the enamored one has come to lose

his place among them and his opportunity.

إذا دعَا خادم شجوٍ إلى

دمعٍ جرَى في الحالِ مرجانه

When a servant of sorrow calls for

tears, his coral flows at once.

فقلبه في مصر مستودعٌ

وفي أقاصي الشام جثمانه

For his heart is deposited in Egypt,

while his body is in the far reaches of Syria.

أغصّه النيل بدمعِ الأسى

ومرَّرتْ ذكراه حلوانه

The Nile choked him with tears of sorrow,

and its remembrance embittered his Hulwan.

وشيبت أيدي النوى شعره

وشاقه الدير وشعرانه

The hands of separation turned his hair gray,

and the monastery and its Sha'ran stirred his longing.

حيث الصّبا تركض أفراسه

وتقنص الآرام فرسانه

Where the horses of youth gallop,

and its riders hunt gazelles.

من كلِّ ريمٍ قد تشوّقته

من قبلِ أن تشتاق أوطانه

Each a gazelle I had yearned for

before his homelands were longed for.

أبداه بالذكرِ فأعجب لمن

يبدأ بالساكنِ بنيانه

He evoked him through remembrance—marvel at one

who begins his building with its inhabitant!

لمنطق من ذكره حسنه

ومن علاء الدِّين إحسانه

Speech owes its beauty to mentioning him,

and its excellence to Ala' al-Din.

أنا أميرُ الشعر في وصف ذا

ومدح ذا رُتّب ديوانه

I am the prince of poetry in describing this one,

and praising that one; its divan has been arranged.

فازت يدا من بعلي الندى

تعلق يمناه وأيمانه

Prosperous are the hands of whoever, to Ali of bounty,

binds his right hand and his oaths.

ذو السر والبر فيا حبَّذا

أسراره الطهر وإعلانه

Keeper of secrets and goodness—how fine

are his pure secrets and his public conduct!

والمرتقي علياء يعشو إلى

كتابه في الأوج كيوانه

And he who climbs a height where, peering toward

his writing at the zenith, is its Saturn.

ورتبة في الأفقِ قد رجَحت

من قبل أن يرصد ميزانه

And a rank on the horizon that has already tipped the scales,

before its Balance was observed.

للدين والدنيا عليهِ سناً

يعرب عن فحواه عنوانه

For religion and the world a radiance shines upon him,

whose title makes its import clear.

فحبَّذا لمادحيه الندى

وأنعمُ الله ورضوانه

How fine is the bounty for his praisers,

and God's blessings and His good pleasure!

الشعر فيك ملك قابل

وقابل في الغير شيطانه

Poetry has met an angel in you,

and in others it has met its devil.

لوعدِه من كرمِ ذكرِه

حتى إذا وفى فنسيانه

Generosity makes him remember his promise,

until he fulfills it—and then forgets it.

كأنَّما البحر له راحة

وهذه الأنهر خلجانه

It is as though the sea were his palm,

and these rivers its inlets.

كأنَّما ألفاظه روضةٌ

وهذه الأطراس غدرانه

It is as though his words were a garden,

and these sheets its pools.

زهت رياض الملك من حين ما

هزَّت من الأقلامِ أغصانه

The gardens of kingship have bloomed ever since

its branches of pens began to sway.

وطوَّق الخلق بإنعامه

فرجَّعت بالحمدِ ألحانه

He garlanded mankind with his favors,

and its melodies echoed in praise.

لطائفِ البيت الذي لم يزل

لطائف الآمال أركانه

The graces of the house that has always endured:

its pillars are the graces of hope.

كلّ امرئٍ سلمانه بالوَلا

وكلّ مهدِي المدح حسَّانه

Every man is its Salman through loyalty,

and every giver of praise its Hassan.

من معشرٍ هم في الندى سحبه

وفي ظلام الخطب شهبانه

From a company who are bounty's clouds,

and, in calamity's darkness, its shooting stars.

إلى فتى الخطَّاب ساميّهم

تفننُ الفضل وأفنانه

To al-Khattab's noble youth, their lofty one,

extend virtue's varied forms and branches.

من عمر نور التقى والعلى

إلى عليّ آل برهانه

From Umar, light of piety and eminence,

its proof has passed to Ali.

فأنتَ ذو النورين من ذا وذا

عليّه أم أنتَ عثمانه

You thus bear two lights, from this one and that:

are you its Ali, or are you its Uthman?

يا شائد البيت النظيم الذي

على التقى أسَّس بنيانه

O builder of the well-ordered house, who

founded its structure upon piety!

يا صاحبَ اللفظ فريداً بهِ

فهو على الحالين سحبانه

O master of speech, peerless in it,

for in both states he is its Sahban!

يا راشق الرأي السديد الذي

أنفذه بالسعدِ سلطانه

O shooter of sound judgment, which

his sovereign has made effective through good fortune!

يا ذا اليراع المجتلي بارقاً

وفي فجاج الأرض هتانه

O master of the reed pen, gleaming as lightning,

its downpour in the broad ways of the earth!

مجانس يحيى العلى والردى

خطابهُ الحلو وخطبانه

Akin to Yahya of eminence and to death

are his sweet discourse and his dire affairs.

في يدك البيضاء يوم الوغى

يلتقم الأهوال ثعبانه

In your white hand, on the day of battle,

its serpent swallows terrors.

وفي الندى يا نوح عمر العلى

يلتهم الأموال طوفانه

And in bounty, O Noah of glory's lifetime,

its flood devours wealth.

كالذَّابل الخطيّ لكنَّه

في البرّ أو في الخصب ريَّانه

Like the slender spear of al-Khatt, yet

in dry land or fertile country it is well-watered.

ما لبس من لاقاه يوم الوغى

دروعه بل هي أكفانه

Whoever met him on battle's day did not don

his armor—rather, those were his shrouds.

لو لم ينبه جفنه كالئاً

ما غمضت للسيفِ أجفانه

Had he not kept his eyelid alert, standing guard,

the sword's eyelids would not have closed.

لو لم يحرر قوله مفصحاً

ما صممت في الروع خرسانه

Had he not refined his speech with eloquence,

his mute spears would not have struck home amid terror.

لو لم يصغ جوهر إدراجه

ما أزهرت بالمدحِ تيجانه

Had he not fashioned the jewel of his writing,

his crowns would not have blossomed with praise.

يا صاحب الهيبة أليَّة

حيث الرجا تفهق غدرانه

O lord of awe—I swear it—

where hope's pools overflow!

يا صاحب الرأفة والعطف لا

نسيم نعمانٍ ولا بانه

O lord of compassion and tenderness—not

Nu'man's breeze, nor its ben trees!

يا سيِّدي دعوة ذي حالةٍ

أحالها الدهر وعدوانه

O my lord, the plea of a man whose condition

time and its aggression have transformed.

تفليسه في الشام بعد الغنى

يقضي بأن القلب حرَّانه

His impoverishment in Syria after wealth

decrees that his heart burns with thirst.

فارقَ أولاداً وأهلاً وما

تحمَّلت للبين أظعانه

He parted from children and kin, though

his caravans had not set out in separation.

ذو الفقر في أوطانه نأيه

وذو الغنى في النأي أوطانه

The poor man's exile is in his homelands,

and the rich man's homelands are in exile.

ضاقَ به إلاَّ إليك الفضا

وحثَّه حاشاكَ حرمانه

All space has narrowed for him, except toward you,

and his deprivation—far be it from you!—has driven him on.

فالدهر لونٌ واحدٌ عنده

طرًّا وعند الناس ألوانه

For time is one color to him,

all of it, while for people it has many colors.

سقياكَ يا من في يدِي فضلهِ

سيحان داعيه وجيحانه

May you be watered, O you in whose bounty's two hands

are your supplicant's Sayhan and Jayhan!

ودونك الأجر الذي قبله

سريع هذا الفضل عجلانه

And take the reward, before which

this swift bounty comes hastening.

هذا وذا البحر أتى درَّه

وجاء للمعدنِ عقيانه

This—and its pearls have come to this sea,

and its pure gold has come to the mine.