1. I heed your call, O heart of days gone by, you called me
I hid in its fragrance my love and my faith

2. Days when passionate love would happily twitter
And the cheer of life would chime to my tunes

3. When people nurtured hopes gilded
That came apart from biers and coffins

4. Alas, the rule of the unjust is irreversible
The strong submitted to it and the weak grew bold

5. It drew the idiot lot in a land
With no moderation, just ignorance and knowledge

6. So to knowledge it was ignorance in its arrogance
And to ignorance it was knowledge in its conceit

7. Its excuse is a glimmer in pitch black night
To its confused heart some hope still clings

8. Like a wanderer lost in a scorching desert
As if it were anguish in the dream of a thirsty man

9. He walks with embers blazing in his eyelids
On the fiery sands from valley to valley

10. And mirages betray on his lips
As if they were the devil's mockery of man

11. Until he reached at dusk an oasis
Where the clouds' shade gathers like a cave

12. Yet he did not choose, but lusted for thirst
And his lips met the fangs of a snake

13. In that raging time, I wore the garb of a lad
Whose nature exuded Gassan's glories

14. Of generosity now gone from our hands
In his hands gesturing still persists

15. Dreams of Lebanon, bodies on his lips
As if Lebanon itself never left Lebanon

16. He would listen to sorcery and bring it to life
Seeing in every rune the return of Iwan

17. And not like omens in etiquette a guide
To the lost or rousing the complacent

18. And like imagination a tongue to incite
A disdainful populace to rebuild

19. And it happened that free speech was in his blood
Spreading the embers of hate in the tyrant's heart

20. Who said: Your rhetoric in your pretensions is a threat
To my subjects, inciting them to rebel

21. Did you not hear the people cheering for me?
The people are mine and time is my ally

22. So the free man sheathed in his eyes a blaze
From his two gazes like volcanoes spewing lava

23. And said: Your subjects are not yours, my king
So you own nothing but some blind subjects

24. Be whoever you want, be the whole world
You will not equal one friend in my measure

25. The beauty of my heart is bare on my lips
And the light of my soul knotted in my lashes

26. And how can I lie when the world reveals me
Even myouter self, even my fleeting body

27. I look upon the river in clarity and murkiness
Can its tranquility and radiance be hidden from the willow and acacia?

28. For light each of its channels is polished
And each bend for love has two breasts

29. So that towering mountain fed me
The food of eagles, and this river gave me drink

30. Restrain your tyranny and wash your sinful heart
Oppression lasts a day, the oppressed will have their day

31. The throne of the unjust one is on the volcano of his shame
An insult engraved in the heart of a drunken tyrant

32. The people's ruler was never their master
Mastery never needed crowns

33. However defiant these subjects might be
Without you among them, none is sovereign

34. Obey your conscience though the world be against it
And when I disobeyed in my misguidance, you reproached me

35. So take off and change your attire of war for a new foundation
Be yours reconciliation, and tyranny be your two garments

36. Who are you? You are a black hand raised
Only to divide dear ones and brothers

37. Where are you from? From vices - had my soul felt it
I would not have sold my plains and trees

38. Who brought you to us, people's folly my king?
Not builder but destroyer he is in you

39. You have committed adultery, yet were not sated
You have fornicated, yet no lovers rejoiced

40. The sword is at my head for you to behead
And mine is upon you though eyes be veiled

41. Nothing remains of you but vanishing fruits
Ruses rotting on some of the tree branches

42. Do you not hear the blowing wind? It echoes
The crawling of specters and shrouds

43. So the angry tyrant fumed and on him appeared
Phantoms of whales and serpents

44. And his wicked soul issued what in its vileness
It possessed of red desire for crimson blood

45. And he shouted: If thus is your tongue with me
Then I have a tongue whose answer is death

46. So the free man glared at the unjust and said:
Rule tomorrow or I die today, it is the same

47. All I want is for you not to interrupt me
Let me finish my defense, O criminal