إن القصائد قد علمن بأنني

إن القصائد قد علمن بأنني

صنع اللسان بهن لا أتنحل

صنع اللسان بهن لا أتنحل

The poems have indeed come to know that I am

Indeed, the poems have learned that I

My poems surely know that I

a master of language through them, claiming no other’s work as mine.

am deft of tongue with them, and do not claim another's verse as mine.

Made language to serve me, without fuss or quibble.

وإذا ابتدأت عروض نسج ريض

وإذا ابتدأت عروض نسج ريض

جعلت تذل لما أريد وتسهل

جعلت تذل لما أريد وتسهل

When I embark upon a meter of tractable weaving,

And when I begin a pattern of untamed weaving,

And when I start spinning out those verse lines smooth,

I make it submit to what I desire and grow easy,

it begins to yield to what I wish and grows easy,

They grow tame and do just what I want, placid.

حتى تطاوعني ولو يرتاضها

حتى تطاوعني ولو يرتاضها

غيري لحاول صعبة لا تقبل

غيري لحاول صعبة لا تقبل

until it obeys me—though, were another to try to train it,

until it obeys me; yet if its taming were attempted

Until they're perfectly obedient, even if

he would attempt it only to meet it hard and refusing to yield.

by someone other than me, he would be tackling an unruly one that will not submit.

Someone else tried, they'd find them intractable.