عذيري من حب ليلى عذيري

أما لي من جفوها من مجيرِ

Who will defend me against loving Layla—who?

Have I no protector against her coldness?

تعلقتها كالغزال الغرير

على غفلات الزمان الغريرِ

I fell in love with her, a guileless gazelle,

in the unguarded moments of unwary time.

تميل كما مال خوط الأراك

وتمشي كما أرتج متن الغديرِ

She sways as a slender arak branch sways,

and walks as the surface of a pool ripples.

فلله كم لي من زفرة

على النأي مشفوعة بالزفير

By God, how many a sigh is mine,

over separation, accompanied by deep sighing.

أغالب في طيها العاذلات

فأضمرها جذوة في ضميري

I struggle against the reproaching women to conceal it,

and harbor it as an ember in my heart.

وجسمي من حبها مسقم

وحالي حال بأمر خطيرِ

My body is sick from loving her,

and my condition is one of grave peril.

سقى حلباً حلب المعصرات

وجاد رباها بجود مطيرِ

May the milk of rain clouds water Aleppo,

and lavish rainy bounty on its hills.

فما أنسى موقفنا سحرة

وقد برد الحلي برد الثغورِ

I shall never forget where we stood before dawn,

when the ornaments were as cool as lips.

أنا قل بثي حمر الخدود

بيض السواك سود الشعورِ

I share my sorrow with the red-cheeked ones,

their tooth-sticks white, their hair black.

أغرت على الحسن من بعد ما

ملأت من الحقد صدر الغيورِ

I raided beauty after

I had filled the jealous one's breast with malice.

فلو عدلوا اختصروا لوعتي

وثقل غرامي اختصار الخصورِ

If they were fair, they would shorten my anguish

and my passion's weight, as they narrow their waists.

فالبصب يحسن لثم الثغور

وبابن المظفر ثلم الصغورِ

For kissing lips befits the lover,

and breaching frontiers befits Ibn al-Muzaffar.

فتى يده مزنة ثرة

ومرتعه عصمة المستجيرِ

A young man whose hand is a copious rain cloud,

and whose pasture protects the seeker of refuge.

أبيّ إذا سيم خسفا أبي

ثريّ الجود عف الضميرِ

Unbowed: when subjected to humiliation, he refuses,

rich in generosity, pure of conscience.

تردد في كرم أول

فحاز مداه ومجد أخيرِ

He ranged through the generosity of old,

and attained its utmost reach and latter-day glory.

طويل نجاد الحسام الصقيل

وأثقب في رأيه من قصيرِ

Long is his polished sword's baldric,

and his judgment is more penetrating than Qasir's.

له همة تتعالى به

فهمتها في عبور العبورِ

He has an ambition that bears him aloft,

its aim to pass beyond al-Abur, Sirius.

وللبشر في وجهه رونق

يدل على النجع مثل البشير

Good cheer has a radiance upon his face

that heralds bounty, like a bearer of good news.

كأن شمائله شمال

تنم بأسرار روض نضيرِ

His qualities are like a north wind

revealing the secrets of a lush garden.

كريم صفت لي أخلاقه

على كدر الدهر صفو النميرِ

A generous man, whose character became clear to me,

amid time's murk, like the clarity of pure, sweet water.

نظرت إليه فحاولته

أخا عزمات بعيد النظيرِ

I looked toward him and sought him out:

a man of firm resolves, whose equal is far to seek.

تريه من الحزم آراؤه

مشيَّعة ما وراء الأمورِ

His prudent judgments show him,

strengthened as they are, what lies beyond events.

أمام الكتيبة في مأزق

تخرق فيه جيوب النحورِ

At the battalion's head in a perilous strait,

where collars are torn open at the throats.

فيا ابن الحماة ومن ملكهم

يدور مع الفلك المستديرِ

O son of protectors, and of men whose dominion

revolves with the circling celestial sphere:

بدور ندى نطقوا بالنوال

وجادوا لسائلهم بالبدورِ

full moons of bounty, who spoke through gifts

and lavished treasure-purses on their petitioners.

ألست مذيت عداك الردى

بسمر أناث وبيض ذكورِ

Have you not dealt death to your enemies,

with brown female spears and white male swords,

وكل فتى فوق عبل الشّوى

ومحبوكة كالبديل المريرِ

and every young warrior atop a stout-limbed steed,

and a tightly built mare, like a firmly twisted cord?

إذا أقبلت كان فوق القبول

وإن أدبرت كان فوقالدبورِ

When she advances, he is above the east wind;

and when she retreats, he is above the west wind.

فدى لك من لا يرون العطاء

ولا يصلون جناح الفقيرِ

May those who will not countenance giving be your ransom,

nor mend the poor man's wing.

أكفهم من حديد إذا

سألت وأوجههم من صخورِ

Their palms are iron when

you ask, and their faces are rock.

إذا بيضوا وجه عافيهم

فذاك البياض بياض القتبرِ

If they whiten their petitioner's face,

that whiteness is the whiteness of gray hair.

لقد أسرتني عقال الخطوب

فهار نشطت عقال الأسيرِ

Misfortune's tether has taken me captive;

then will you not loosen the captive's tether?

رجوتك يا خير من يرتجي

لجبر الكسير ويسر العسيرِ

I have set my hope in you, best of those looked to

to mend the broken and ease the difficult.

وليس فتى يؤثر المكرما

ت بعدك غير فتاك الأثيرِ

No young man favors noble deeds

after you, except your favored young man.

كأني لما تعلقته

لعز تعلقت ركني ثبيرِ

When I grew attached to him, it was as though

for strength I had clung to Thabir's two pillars.

لقد هجم العيد فاستسعدا

به وبمجيئته والمرورِ

The festival has suddenly arrived; rejoice, both of you,

in it, in its coming and its passing.

وجودا عليّ بها حلة

تعبر عن أرج كالعبيرِ

And grant me, for it, a robe

that breathes a fragrance like blended perfume.

أجرر أذيالها عالما

بأني أحق بها من جريرِ

I shall drag its trailing hems, knowing

that I deserve it more than Jarir.

وخذها مبرأة حرة

أبت أن تكون للص مغير

And take it, unblemished and freeborn:

it refuses to belong to a raiding thief.

إذا أنشدت فعلت بالعقو

ل ما ليس تفعل كأس المدير

When recited, it does to the minds

what the cupbearer's cup cannot do.

وعش أنت وابناك نعمة

مدى الدهر مابقيا ابنا سمير

And live, you and your two sons, in bliss,

for all time, as long as Samir's two sons—night and day—endure.