Sol 6.1

  1. كم نابلٍ في طرفيك البابلي

    وذابلٍ في عطفِك الذابلِ

    How many an archer in your Babylonian eyes,

    And many a slender spear in your slender flank.

  2. وكم حوى ردفُك من موجةٍ

    تضربُ من خصركَ في ساحِلِ

    How many a wave your hips contain,

    Breaking upon the shoreline of your waist.

  3. يا كوكباً ناظرُه طالعاً

    كناظرٍ في كوكبٍ آفلِ

    O star, to gaze upon you rising

    Is like gazing upon a setting star.

  4. أوقعني منك على مانعٍ

    مخايلٌ عندك من باذِلِ

    I was brought up against your withholding

    By signs in you of a willing giver:

  5. طَلاقةٌ أنشأ لي برقُها

    سحائباً من دمعيَ الهاطلِ

    A cheerfulness whose lightning raised for me

    Clouds of my pouring tears;

  6. وسقمُ أجفانٍ توهّمتُها

    ترثي لسُقْمِ الجسدِ الناحلِ

    And languid eyelids, which I imagined

    Were pitying my wasted body's sickness;

  7. ومعطفٌ معتدلٌ مائلٌ

    مالي وللمعتدلِ المائلِ

    And a figure, upright yet swaying—

    What have I to do with the upright yet swaying?

  8. حبُّكَ لا حبُكَ هذا الذي

    أوقعَ في أنشوطةِ الحابلِ

    Love of you, not your grain, is what

    Has cast me into the fowler's noose.

  9. وليتَني أشكو الى عاذرٍ

    أو ليتَني أشكو من العاذلِ

    And would that I could complain to one who would excuse me,

    Or would that I could complain of the reproacher.

  10. وليلةٍ أسلمتُ أصداءَها

    من أكؤسِ الراح الى صاقِلِ

    And many a night whose rust I surrendered

    To a polisher drawn from cups of wine:

  11. فالتهَبَتْ فحمتُها جمرةً

    من خمرةٍ قاتلةِ القاتلِ

    Then its charcoal flared into an ember

    From wine that slays the slayer.

  12. واتّسقَتْ نحوي مسرّاتُها

    نسْقَ الأنابيبِ الى العاملِ

    And its delights aligned themselves toward me

    As spear-shaft sections lead toward the head,

  13. كخاطرِ الأسعدِ في كُتْبِه

    للحافظِ الحَبْرِ عن الكاملِ

    Like al-As'ad's thought in his letters

    To al-Hafiz, the scholar, on behalf of al-Kamil.

  14. روضُ بلاغاتٍ سَقاها الحِجا

    ما شاءَ من طلٍّ ومن وابلِ

    A garden of eloquence which reason watered

    With all it wished of dew and downpour.

  15. خمائلُ الزهرِ له تغتدي

    ملتفّةً في سمَلِ الخاملِ

    Beside it, flowering thickets become

    Wrapped in the threadbare garb of the obscure.

  16. رسائلٌ تُخبِرُ أنواعُها

    عن خاطرٍ متقدٍ سائلِ

    Letters whose varied forms tell

    Of a mind ablaze and flowing.

  17. تعجِزُ قِسّاً في أيادٍ بها

    وتعتَلي سحبانَ في وائلِ

    They leave Quss among Iyad powerless

    And surpass Sahban among Wa'il.

  18. للمَلِكِ الكاملِ في طيّها

    ذكرٌ كَساها صفةَ الكاملِ

    Within their folds, King al-Kamil receives

    A mention that clothes them in perfection.

  19. تَفدي ملوكُ الأرضِ ملْكاً نَضا

    بُردَيْهِ عن كافٍ لهمْ كافِلِ

    Earth's kings would sacrifice themselves for a king who has cast

    His two cloaks aside, revealing their capable guardian.

  20. يدفعُ عنهم وهُمُ جُندُه

    كذلك السنِّ مع الذابِلِ

    He defends them, though they are his troops—

    As the spearhead does the slender shaft.

  21. وفيه للدُنيا وللدين ما

    يستَعجِزُ القائلَ بالفاعلِ

    And in him, for worldly life and faith, are deeds

    That leave the speaker helpless before the doer.

  22. فالسيفُ يروي منه عن جارِمٍ

    والضيفُ يَروي منهُ عن عادِلِ

    For the sword tells of him as a wrongdoer,

    And the guest tells of him as a just man.

  23. وسائلٍ عنه فقلتُ استمِعْ

    من عالمٍ لا كنتَ من جاهلِ

    And to one who asked about him I said: Listen

    To one who knows—may you not be among the ignorant.

  24. حسبُك ما تُبصِرُ من كتبِه

    الى الفقيهِ العالِمِ العاملِ

    Enough for you is what you see of his letters

    To the jurist, the scholar who acts on his knowledge.

  25. والمرءُ ما عبّر عن فضلِه

    بمثلِ ميلٍ منهُ للفاضلِ

    And no man has expressed his own merit

    Better than through his fondness for the worthy.

  26. أكرمُ منه عاجلاً مَنْ غَدا

    يُكرمُه الرحمنُ في الآجلِ

    Nobler than he in this life is one

    Whom the All-Merciful will honor in the next.

  27. من دين دينِ الحقّ مُستهلِكٌ

    حتى اقتضاهُ من يدِ الباطِلِ

    Some debt owed to true faith lay with a squanderer,

    Until he exacted it from falsehood's hand.

  28. مُشْرعُ شرعٍ قد سرى خِصْبُهُ

    في بلدِ المعرفةِ الماجلِ

    A fount of sacred law whose fertility has spread

    Through the water-filled land of knowledge.

  29. مناقبٌ قد نُظِمَتْ حِليةً

    على صدورِ الزمنِ العاطلِ

    Virtues strung into an ornament

    Upon the unadorned breasts of time.

  30. خُذها من الخاطرِ خطّارةً

    قليلةَ الناقدِ لا الناقلِ

    Take it, swaying proudly from the mind,

    With few discerning critics, not few transmitters.

  31. في عرَضِ الأشعارِ من حُسْنِها

    ما شئتَهُ من جوهرٍ قابِلِ

    Within verse's outward form, its beauty offers

    All you could wish of receptive substance.

  32. تُنسي العتاهيَّ لها قولَهُ

    يا إخوتي إن الهَوى قاتلي

    It makes al-'Atahi forget, for its sake, his words:

    ‘O my brothers, love is my slayer.’

  33. ولو حَواها لم يَقُلْ سائلاً

    ماذا تردّون على السائِلِ

    And had he possessed it, he would not have said as a petitioner:

    ‘What answer do you give the petitioner?’