Sol 6.1

  1. كُرُوباتْكِينُ يومُك غير أمسِ

    فلي بك في هزائمِك التأسي

    Kuropatkin, your day is unlike yesterday;

    for I find solace in you amid your defeats.

  2. كلانا حائر يشقيك خصمٌ

    ويشقيني من استصفته نفسي

    Both of us are bewildered: a foe makes you suffer,

    and one my soul chose as a friend makes me suffer.

  3. وقد خُيِّبْتَ في سهم وترس

    كما خيبت في قلم وطرس

    And you have been thwarted with arrow and shield,

    as I was thwarted with pen and page.

  4. وما قصرتُ في أدب وعلم

    وما قصرتَ في عزم وبأس

    And I did not fall short in literature and learning,

    and you did not fall short in resolve and valor.

  5. وهزّك قيصر الجبار حتى

    كأنك قائم عنه بعرس

    And the tyrant Tsar so roused you

    that you seemed to be standing in for him at a wedding.

  6. تعجل سعدُهُ فأدرت كأساً

    ودار النجم لو تدري بنحس

    His good fortune hastened, so you passed around a cup,

    while the star revolved—if only you knew—ominously.

  7. فبت تعانق الأسَلَ اختيالاً

    وتأنس بالصوارم أي أنس

    So you spent the night embracing spears in swaggering pride,

    and delighting in keen swords—such delight!

  8. لتأخذ هامة ابن الشمس غصباً

    وتهدي تاجه لأقلِّ رأس

    To seize the head of the Son of the Sun by force,

    and offer his crown to the lowliest head.

  9. لقصر في بلاد الصين سامٍ

    رجاك الروس أم لبناء رمس

    Was it for a lofty palace in the lands of China

    that the Russians placed their hopes in you—or to build a tomb?

  10. وما صنعت بذاك الثلج نارٌ

    لذي غضبٍ بعيدِ العفوِ شَكْسِ

    And what could fire accomplish against that snow

    for a wrathful man, slow to pardon and ill-tempered?

  11. أقيصر إن قومك ما توانوا

    ولا كانوا بلا ظفر وضرس

    O Tsar, your people did not falter,

    nor were they without claw and tooth.

  12. ولكن سُقْتَهُم للحرب كَرهاً

    وما أمنوك في جدب وحبس

    But you drove them to war against their will,

    and they did not trust you amid famine and imprisonment.

  13. وما نفع القتال بلا رجاء

    لجند خاضع للذل سلس

    And what use is fighting without hope

    for a docile army, submissive to humiliation?

  14. وهل يأبى على الأعصار صرح

    تريد به السماء بغير أسِّ

    And can an edifice defy the ages

    when you seek the sky with it, without a foundation?

  15. فذق ثمرات حكمك في عباد

    قد استثمرت فيهم شر غرس

    So taste the fruits of your rule over subjects

    among whom you have made the worst planting bear fruit.

  16. شغلتهمُ بهذي الحرب عنه

    تعالج علة صعبت بخمس

    You distracted them from it with this war,

    treating a stubborn ailment with quintan fever.

  17. وما استبداد قيصر في رعايا

    أضاعوا العمر من نَقَهٍ لِنَكْس

    And what of a Tsar's tyranny over subjects

    who have wasted their lives from convalescence to relapse?

  18. عمالقةَ العتاةِ البيضِ هذا

    من الصفرِ القصارِ أجلُّ درس

    O giants among the white tyrants, this

    is the greatest lesson from the short yellow men.

  19. فأين فوارس القوزاق يعنو

    لها الفرسان من تتر وفرس

    Where, then, are the Cossack horsemen, before whom bow

    the horsemen of the Tatars and Persians?

  20. وأين علوُّكم فيما ادعيتم

    وعزتكم على الجار الأخسِّ

    And where is your vaunted superiority,

    and your might over the baser neighbor?

  21. أيرجع قيصر المغوار يوماً

    يقول الحرب رجس أي رجس

    Will the valiant Tsar one day return

    saying, 'War is filth—utter filth'?

  22. دعوا أرضاً يضلكمُ ضحاها

    وينهسكم ثراها شر نهس

    Leave a land whose morning light leads you astray,

    and whose soil bites you with the cruelest bite.

  23. فما تدري الكتائب أين تمشي

    ولا تدري السفائن أين ترسي

    For the battalions do not know where they march,

    nor do the ships know where to anchor.

  24. أبيتم أن يناصفَكم محقٌّ

    فقد عدتم ولم تنجوا بسدسِ

    You refused to let one in the right share equally with you;

    so you have returned without saving even a sixth.