بصائرنا في القضا خامده

وكل قضيته واحده

Our insights lie dormant before fate,

and its every judgment is one and the same.

ففيم التصور تحت العمى

وفيم الدعاوي ولا شاهده

What use is speculation under blindness,

and what use are claims without a witness?

رأيت التقصي بآرائنا

بحتم القضا فضلة زائده

I deem inquiry by our own judgments,

before fate's certainty, a needless excess.

ولو فاز رأي بموهوبة

فأم القضاء له والده

Even if an opinion wins some gift,

the mother of fate has given it birth.

وكل الوجود ببحر الشئون

حقيقته نقطة راكده

All existence, in the sea of affairs,

is in truth a motionless drop.

وخبطك بالرأي تحت القضا

ذهول وعجرفة بادره

Your floundering through opinions beneath fate

is heedlessness and rash arrogance.

وما وهب اللّه من مكنة

فتلك محركة جامده

Whatever capacity God has bestowed

is set in motion, yet inert in itself.

وإن كشف الرأي محجوبة

فتلك برفق القضا وارده

If reason uncovers something hidden,

it arrives through fate's gentle aid.

فسلم إلى اللّه أفعاله

لتجري الأمور على القاعده

So leave God's acts to Him,

that things may follow their proper order.

فما لك حول يرد القضا

وذائدة العجز كالقائده

You have no power to turn fate back,

and what repels helplessness is like what leads it.

وما لك في الأمر من شركة

تأدبولا ذرة واحده

You have no share in the matter—

be reverent—not even a single atom.

تلاقي القضاء بغير الرضا

وأنت على قدرة نافده

You meet fate without contentment,

while relying on an exhausted power.

إذا دبر اللّه أمراً جرى

برغم تدابيرنا الفاسده

When God ordains a matter, it proceeds

despite our faulty plans.

أتنهض رأيك ضد القضا

فأوهن بها نهضة قاعده

Would you raise your judgment against fate?

What a feeble rising, still sitting down!

وفكرك في قدر فائت

وفي مقبل رتبة واحده

Your thought concerning a destiny already past

and one yet to come holds the same rank.

وأفكارنا وسياساتنا

وتدبيرنا شرر خامده

Our thoughts and our policies,

and our planning, are extinguished sparks.

وجد النفوس وكل القوى

إلى نسبة فوقها عائده

The striving of souls and all powers

belong to an order above themselves.

وإن كان لا بد من فكرة

ففي هذه البرهة البائده

If thought must be given to anything,

let it be to this fleeting span,

وفي النشأتين وعقباهما

وصادرة الموت والوارده

to the two births and what follows them,

and to death's departures and arrivals.

أما ترعوي في مراعي الغرور

وصائدة المنتهى راصده

Will you not desist in the pastures of delusion,

while the huntress of the final end lies waiting?

تعيش بها بين مفقودة

وراقبة حتفها فاقده

You live there among those already lost

and the bereaved awaiting their own death,

نهش غل زخرف منقض

وتعرض عن دارنا الآبده

greedy for the fetters of vanishing finery,

and turn away from our everlasting home.

وتنسى المنايا وقد أنفذت

مقاتلنا الأسهم الصادره

You forget death, though already they have pierced

our vital places—the arrows sent forth.

نروح ونغدو على مأمن

وآساد آجالنا حارده

We go and come as though secure,

while the lions of our appointed deaths are enraged.

ننازع أيامنا صفوها

وما للصفاء بها واجده

We wrestle with our days for their serenity,

though none can find serenity in them.

ونأمن فيها هجوم الردى

وليس لهجمته جاحده

We feel safe there from death's assault,

though none can deny its onslaught.

وتنعي الجنائز أرواحنا

ودمعة أعيننا جامده

Funeral processions announce our souls' deaths,

yet the tears in our eyes remain frozen.

تثير السوافي علينا الثرى

وذاك السفا الأعظم الهامده

Dust-bearing winds stir earth over us,

and the greatest dust-bank is the lifeless earth.

نوى الأصل والفرع في بطنها

وقد بقيت نوبة واحده

The seeds of root and branch lie in its belly,

and only one turn remains.

وهيهات قد بادرت زرعها

ومدت مناجلها الحاصده

But far from it! It has already rushed upon its crop,

and stretched out its harvesting sickles.

علام التهافت في حائل

وقد علق القيد بالآبده

Why rush headlong after what passes,

when even the enduring is caught in fetters?

سيعلو البلاء إلى الفرقدي

ن ينتهب الصحبة الخالده

Affliction will rise to the Farqadayn,

plundering their everlasting companionship.

ويصدع في قبة الشمس من

غوائله صدعة صاعده

And it will cleave, in the dome of the sun,

through its calamities, a rising rift.

وتبلى الجديدين مقدورة

من الخطب بارقة راعده

A destined stroke will wear out night and day,

an ordeal flashing and thundering.

ويدهى الوديع بنعمائه

زوال معيشته الراعده

One resting in his blessings is stricken

by the passing of his trembling life.

كأن الردى حاسد للمعا

ش وحتى على شظف الهابده

As though death envied people's livelihood,

even the privation of the colocynth-gatherer.

إلى أين يسمو علو البنا

وقرح المعول بالقاعده

How high can this building rise,

with the pickaxe's wound at its foundation?

ترفق بطينة هذا البنا

فهاتيك أجسامنا الهامده

Handle gently the clay of this building,

for those are our lifeless bodies.

نشاهد تفتيت أجسامنا

وليس لأرواحنا شاهده

We watch our bodies being broken apart,

yet there is no witness to our souls.

ولكنها حبست في العمى

وسوف تعود لها عائده

But they are confined in blindness,

and a return awaits them.

متى ينزع الموت عن فتكه

فتبقى لمولودها الوالده

When will death desist from its slaughter,

so a mother may remain for her newborn?

يحز الحياة شباً قارظ

ولم تنتبه هذه الراقده

A gnawing edge cuts life apart,

yet this sleeper has not awakened.

وإن حياة إلى منتهى

خيال يحول بلا فائده

A life that runs toward an end

is a passing phantom without benefit.

حظيرة مفتقد ما بها

هناء سوى صرخة الفاقده

A mourner's enclosure, with no

joy but the bereaved woman's cry.

وتفتأ تعقد آمالنا

وينجل ما تعقد العاقده

Our hopes keep tying their knots,

while what the knotter binds unravels.

يصال على صيحة المعتدي

فتنشب بين اللها الزارده

An attack is made at the aggressor's shout,

and the choking blow lodges in the throat.

يلم السوابغ سرادها

فتفرجها الطعنة السارده

The armorer joins the ample coats of mail,

but a piercing thrust parts them.

ويفري المدجج حد الردى

فما تدفع الشكة الهامده

Death's edge tears the armored warrior,

and lifeless armor cannot ward it off.

وما يحفز الدهر إلا البلا

وإن أسجحت يده الآبده

Time sends forth nothing but affliction,

even when its enduring hand deals gently.

ممض فما تنقضي ليلة

ولم تكن الليلة العامده

It is searing: no night passes

without being a night intent on harm.

لياليه كالسفن ميادة

ببلواه غامدة آمده

Its nights sway like ships,

plunging into its afflictions, bearing down.

دهت ذات روقين من خطبة

بموئد مقصدة قاصده

A two-horned calamity came from its ordeals,

with crushing force, deadly and deliberate.

فكرت ولا رأي في ردها

ولا فاتها مهرب الشارده

It charged, and no counsel could repel it,

nor did any fugitive's refuge escape it.

أتت لا يؤبسها قارص

ولا تنقي الأبرج المارده

It came; no biting cold could wither it,

nor did it spare the towering battlements.

تؤز الصياخيد أهوالها

فما بال أكبادنا الكابده

Its terrors shake the solid rocks—

what, then, of our suffering hearts?

فما استنزفت من دماء القلو

ب كما استنزفت من أسى الواجده

It has not drained the blood of hearts

as it has drained the grieving soul's anguish.

ولا امترست لسماء العلو

م حتى تكدكت الماهده

Nor did it grapple with the heaven of learning

until the firmly grounded earth had crumbled.

لها أجهشت بالبكاء السما

تناوح أجفاننا الساهده

For it, the heavens burst into tears,

wailing in answer to our sleepless eyelids.

رزيئة دهر فجعنا بها

لأفظع مفجعة حاشده

The calamity of time that bereaved us

is truly a most dreadful, overwhelming grief.

نحت مستقر الندى والهدى

فدكتهما دكة واحده

It made for the abode of generosity and guidance,

and crushed them both with a single blow.

فهل صادف الدهر ثاراً بها

وداوى بها علة عامده

Did time find vengeance through it,

and deliberately cure some ailment with it?

تحزمت المجد في غارة

شناخيب رضوى بها مائده

It encircled glory in a raid

that set Radwa's towering peaks swaying.

أغارت شعوب على خيرنا

وكانت لميقاتها راصده

Shaʿūb, Death, raided the best of us,

and had lain watching for its appointed hour.

رزئنا المرزء طود العلا

أبا صالح عيلم الوارده

We lost the afflicted one, the mountain of eminence,

Abu Salih, a sea for those who came to drink.

رزئناه غيثاً يعم الملا

وقد أعدمت غيثها الرائده

We lost him, a rain that reached all people,

when the pasture-seeker had lost her rain.

تخطف أحمد ريب الردى

فيا حرب الحمد والحامده

Death's treachery snatched Ahmad away—

alas for praise and its praisers, despoiled!

حمدنا الزمان به برهة

فصالت عليها يد صائده

We praised the age for him awhile,

then a hunting hand pounced upon it.

فما أسوأ العيش من بعده

وما أصغر النوب الوافده

How wretched life is after him,

and how small the calamities that follow!

فيا لحياة قضت نحبها

وكل حياة أمريء نافده

Alas for a life that met its appointed end—

and every mortal life is running out.

حياة القلوب بتلك الحيا

ة واصلاح أنفسنا الفاسده

In that life lay the life of hearts,

and the reform of our corrupted souls.

بضن بها الكون في حجره

فصارت إلى جدث خامده

The universe cherished it jealously in its lap,

then it passed, lifeless, into a grave.

ويوم الضنين كيوم المه

ين وفي المنتهى تقف القاصده

The cherished one's day is like the lowly one's day;

at the final limit, the traveler halts.

وما بيد أحمد بيد امريء

ولكن نفوس الورى بائده

Ahmad's death was not one man's death,

yet the souls of humankind must perish.

لقد كان يرجح ميزانه

وذات الكمال به شاهده

Indeed his scale weighed heavier,

and perfection itself bore witness for him.

يجلي بابلج ذي فرجة

من العلم مشكلة عانده

With luminous insight opening a way, he resolved

a stubborn difficulty in learning.

شداد العوارض آراؤه

إذا اعتزمت خطة ناهده

His judgments had sturdy crossbeams,

whenever a lofty plan was undertaken.

فيا للمعارف حسن العزا

لقد أصبحت سوقها راكده

Alas for learning—may it find good consolation;

its market has indeed fallen idle.

لقد كان نير أفلاكها

فخر إلى حفرة رامده

He was the luminary of its spheres,

then fell into an ashen grave.

فواحربا لصروف القضا

لقد طعنت طعنة عامده

Alas for the vicissitudes of fate!

They have struck a deliberate thrust.

وما من صروف القضا وائل

وما لصروف القضا كارده

None can escape fate's vicissitudes,

and nothing can drive them away.

ولا بد من نهش صل الردى

وما للرقى عنده فائده

There is no escaping the bite of death's viper,

and charms avail nothing against it.

وكيف نضن بأرواحنا

وتلك غنيمته البارده

How can we begrudge our souls,

when they are its effortlessly won spoils?

فيا لهف نفسي على أحمد

إذا نفعت لهفة الفاقدة

O, my soul's yearning for Ahmad,

if a bereaved soul's yearning could help!

سلوت السلو ورشد الأسى

وأحمد أنفاسه خامدة

I have forsaken solace, and sorrow has matured,

while Ahmad's breaths lie still.

لد زهدت نفسه في الوجو

د فهل للحياة معاً زاهدة

His soul had indeed renounced existence;

had it renounced life as well?

تعبد حتى أتاه اليق

ين فذابت له الأنفس العابده

He worshipped until certainty came to him,

and devout souls melted for him.

تحالفت الأرض في عمره

وآرابه الزهر الساجده

In his lifetime, the earth made a covenant

with his radiant limbs bowed in prayer.

فليت حليفة آرابه

وقته بلى التربة الرامده

Would that the ally of his limbs

had shielded him from the decay of the ashen soil!

لقد دهش الكون لما ثوى

فما وجدت رشدها الراشده

The universe was bewildered when he lay buried,

and even the rightly guided could not find her way.

وزلزت الأرض زلزالها

وضاقت بأجزائها هامده

The earth was shaken with its own convulsion,

and lay lifeless, too narrow for its own parts.

وما ضاقت الأرض من رزئه

كما ضاقت المنن الخالده

Yet the earth was not so straitened by his loss

as were the everlasting benefactions.

طوى العالمين إلى ذاته

بطارفة المجد والتالده

He gathered the worlds into his own being,

with glory both newly gained and inherited.