1. Ask the living about me - did an encampment halt
In my abode, and did hope increase my denial?

2. And did the overflowing of wishes, from a sail,
Make my resolve subside, or double my travail?

3. Refusers, delicate as the blowing wind, refused,
And a torrential army, swift, not slow.

4. An attacking band of Tameem tribe, sons of Khandaf,
Saw the arrival of disgrace, not of might they know.

5. They withheld their swords on the day of dogs
With a striking like the heat of fire, not comfort bestow

6. They ransomed the Prophet's prisoners in bondage
Though it was not hoped that their release a price would pay

7.
Hardships of a kingdom not presented to the boastful

8. And lions of darkness not cowed at the break of day
You see a neighbor among us, beyond complaining of stinginess

9. When the living are straitened by guests come their way

10. As if the rumbling, roaring cauldrons in the evening
Were our hearths in crisis and winter at play

11. I strove and left no tradition unless I live on
To copy with my pride the pride of ancestors' days

12.
If I do not show white from the peaks of enemies

13. Then it suffices that I stain my own mantle, I say
In myself from the tyranny of events a defect lies

14. And in clashing with armored foes, my cure lies away
I lacked a heart full of resolve

15. And a gaze that rivals the glance of the sublime in its way
And obvious excellence that its glory conceals

16. A perception refined that distorts not scholars at play
And who do I have whose day the poetry of his nobility

17. Turns from favor and gift-giving away?
The souls of foes would be my wants

18. And the ruin of oath-breakers' zeal my array
I used to pain as my companion, so I forbade

19. Gladness of drinking and of boon friends at play
So wine did not find me save addled and confused

20. Nor jesters' wit, save turning in disdain away
My friend wearies of my austerity, complaining

21. And dislikes my sincerity of companionship's way
It's not that I've abandoned pleasant humor

22. But a heart distressed with separation, I say
But of rulers whose glory the cosmos inhabits

23. My sufficient livelihood lightens my burden away
He preserves his gifts, water on a face it streams

24. Seeking benefit from the miserly in their way
Alas the echo fades not with those extinguished of thirst

25. Even if the thirsty lack water to allay
They say, tempting me with pride - but would that

26. He share with us verses equally, I say!
Yet I and praising the people - the proudest thing to him

27. Though encouraged by the vilest journey on its way
To you, for I am the master of men, what my tongue has uttered

28. And this is the master of ministers, I say
If I build glory and say a poem

29. We rise over masters and the eloquent of their day
And what glory have I not gained through son of Khalid

30. An age of plenty or a generous clime at play?

31. I climbed through his favors to the height of glory
Rising over where poets stand in their way

32. And I faced the turns of fate until I expelled them
Before me, though transgression had been behind my way

33.
It shuns roses of water, grey in humiliation

34. And dislikes plunging deep in horses at play
So no wealth but gained through honor

35. And no gift but drawing praise, I say
Dignified, binding words in the knot of his composure

36. If trouble visits the resting place of the wise at play
A wit and a face when asked a favor

37. Streaming water from life and propriety's way

38. And pure affection whose calm is not marred
By boredom or the advent of betrayal, I say

39. For you the penetrating, unerring in every impasse
Penetrating as arrows fly on the day they stray

40. Reaching, so neither ambiguity with a barrier
For you, nor distance from homesteads far away

41. Brisk in his pace, ideas occur to him as he walks
On sandal soles and staff of greater height at play

42.
He shows you over tombs each eloquent phrase

43. At which the souls of scholars melt away
You graced and battled foes and left no pride

44. For India's whites or generous ones of their day

45. You turned from what insisted to offer itself
Of affairs, with disinterest and no display