محاسن غضت ناظري من تعتبا — أبو الحسن السلامي

محاسن غضّت ناظري من تعتبا

وفضل نهاني وصفه أن أشبّبا

Graces that lowered my gaze and kept it from reproach,

and excellence whose description forbade me to sing of love.

ترى كبرياء الملك فوق جبينه

فتقرأ سطراً بالمهابة معربا

You see the majesty of kingship upon his brow,

and read a line eloquent with awe.

وليس الذي آبؤه وجدوده ال

ملوك كمصوع إذا ما تنسبا

And one whose fathers and forefathers are the

kings is not like a muṣawwaʿ [unclear] when he traces his ancestry.

فيا ناظر الإسلام هل أنت ناظر

إلى خادم أثنى عليك واطنبا

O overseer of Islam, are you looking

toward a servant who praised you at length,

إلى شاعر نادى وقد فغر الردى

له فاه سابور معي فتهيبا

toward a poet who cried out, while death had opened

its mouth at him, “Sabur is with me!”—and death was overawed?

ألم يخبر الشرب النشاوى بقصتي

ولم يتغن الركب بي حين أهذبا

Have the drunken companions not told my story,

and have the riders not sung of me as they sped along?

ولم تتحدث في الخدور بسقطتي

عذارى يقلبن البنان المخضبا

Was my fall not talked of in secluded chambers

by maidens turning their henna-stained fingers?

فدى الشعراء الشامتون بقصتي

فتى في سماء الشعر يطلع كوكبا

May the poets who gloated over my story be ransom

for a youth rising as a star in poetry's sky,

فتى لم يسر الا الذي صاغ أو روى

وان قعقع المغرور منهمواجلبا

a youth whose compositions or recitations alone have traveled,

though the conceited one among them rattled and clamored.

أظنوا بأني ان سقطت تكسرت

قوافي أو عاوت فكري وقدابى

Did they think my fall would shatter

my rhymes, or set them howling at my mind [unclear reading], which refused to yield?

توهن جسمي فاشتمتوا أو تجملوا

ولكن عضباً بين فكي ما نبا

My body weakened: gloat, then, or be gracious,

but the keen sword between my jaws has not missed.

وكم سار شعر قاعد عنه ربه

ودون قول من سطيح وضوبا

How much poetry has traveled while its master stayed behind,

and a saying was recorded from Satih and Duba.

سلوا الموت عني كيف فللت غربه

ونازعته نفسي وقد كر مغضبا

Ask death about me: how I blunted its edge,

and wrested my life from it as it charged in anger.

شربنا وكان الشرب بعد سفورنا

على نرجس قبل الشبيبة شيبا

We drank, our drinking after we had come out

among narcissi gray-haired before their youth.

ودجلة تجلو في المصندل شاطئاً

يرف وطياراً يخف وزبزبا

And the Tigris revealed, in al-Musandal, a shore

shimmering, a tayyar-boat moving lightly, and a zabzab-boat.

وكانت لنا في جبهة الدهر ليلة

كهمك لأن العيش فيها واخصبا

We had a night upon the brow of Time,

like your resolve, for life was within it and flourished.

عفا الدهر عنها بعدما كان ساخطاً

واحسن فيها بعد ما كان مذنبا

Time relented toward it after having been angry,

and did good in it after having done wrong.

فيا فرحتا لو كنت أصبحت سالماً

ويا سوأتا ان مركبي زل اوكبا

Oh, my joy, if only I had awakened unharmed!

And oh, my shame, if my mount slipped or stumbled!

إذا لم أعربد في أواخر نشوتي

فلا عار إن خطب علي توثبا

If I did not run riot in the last stages of my drunkenness,

there is no disgrace if a calamity leaped upon me.

وصبراً على خير الخمار وشره

بما قلت أهلا للكؤوس ومرحبا

And patience with the hangover's good and ill,

since I said to the cups, “Welcome, welcome!”

أروح وصبغ الراح يخضب راحتي

واغدو بعض من دمي قد تخضبا

I go out at evening, wine's hue staining my palm,

and go out at dawn, a part [of me] stained with my blood.

فلو وصبغ الراح يخضب راحتي

واغدو بعضو من دمي قد تخضبا

Then if—while wine's hue stains my palm—

and I go out at dawn with a limb stained with my blood,

فلو بصرت عين الوزير بشاعر

على مركب قد شانه الله مركبا

then if the vizier's eye had seen a poet

on a mount that God had disgraced as a mount,

رأى اللهو ميتاً والمجون ممدداً

صريعاً وجثمان السرور معذبا

he would have seen revelry dead and wantonness laid out,

fallen, and the body of joy tormented.

وباكرني أشياخ قومي فاكثروا ال

فضول لعمري والاذى والتعجبا

My people's elders came early to me, heaping up the

meddling, by my life, and the harm and astonishment.

يقولون لي تب لا تعود لمثلها

وهيهات ضاع الوعظ عندي وخيبا

They tell me, “Repent; do not return to anything like it.”

But far from it! Their counsel was wasted on me and failed.

وكم قبلها قد مت بالسكر مرة

وعدت فكان العود أحلى وأطيبا

Many a time before this have I died of drunkenness,

and returned—and the return was sweeter and more pleasant.

كذا أبداً إما تراني مجررا

ذيولي سكراً أو كسيراً مشعبا

So it is forever: you see me either dragging

my hems in drunkenness, or broken and splinted.

ولكن على الأحرار حمل مؤونتي

إذا ذهبت بي نبوة الدهر مذهبا

But noble men must shoulder my upkeep

when a harsh turn of Time carries me down some path.

ولما جفانا من الفنا وصاله

واخلف عام كان يرجى واجدبا

When one whose companionship we had grown used to shunned us,

and a year we had hoped in failed us and grew barren,

رهنا وصرفنا وبعنا منادلا

وحلياً ومذخوراً الينا محببا

we pawned, exchanged, and sold handkerchiefs,

and jewelry and stored treasures dear to us.

رأيت ابنتي قد أحرزت بعض حليها

فانشدت تعريضاً لها وتشببا

I saw my daughter had secured some of her jewelry,

so I recited a love verse, pointedly alluding to her:

تجول خلاخيل النساء ولا أرى

لرملة خلخالا فقالت هيا أبا

“Women's anklets swing, yet I see

no anklet on Ramla.” She said, “O father,

سلبت الجواري حليهن فلم تدع

سواراً ولا طوفا على النحر مذهبا

you stripped the girls of their jewelry, leaving

no bracelet, nor a gilded necklace upon a throat!”

فقلت لها ظل الوزير يبحنا

جناباً إذا رضا به الدهر اعتبا

So I told her, “The vizier's shelter grants us

a refuge where Time, when pleased with him, makes amends.

إذا كان بدر الملك سابور طالعاً

فلست أبالي بعده من تغيبا

When Sabur, the full moon of kingship, is rising,

then I care not who else is absent.”