ليست صفات علاك مما يمترى

فيها ولا مما يصاغ ويفترى

The qualities of your sublimity are not things one can doubt,

nor things that can be fashioned and fabricated.

مدحتك قبل مديحنا لك همة

أغنتك شهرة فضلها أن تشهرا

Before our praise could praise you, your own high resolve had done so—

its excellence made you independent of the fame praise brings.

وعلت فشامخ مجدها لا يرتقى

وغلت فباذخ قدرها لا يشترى

It rose so high that its towering glory cannot be scaled,

and became so precious that its exalted worth cannot be bought.

يا بدر والبدر المنير عبارة

عن نور وجهك لم يزل لك مسفرا

O full moon—the radiant full moon is only an image

for the light of your face, forever shining unveiled.

إن النزاهة والنباهة أقسما

لا صاحباً أحداً سواك من الورى

Integrity and distinction have sworn

to take no companion among mankind but you.

ولو أن ألسنة المكارم والعلى

حاولن غيرك صاحباً لتعذرا

Even if the tongues of noble deeds and lofty honors

tried to take another companion, they could not.

ولقد جمعت بما فرقت من الندى

فرقاً من الأهواء كانت نفرا

By scattering your bounty, you gathered together

divided passions that had once stood estranged.

وزرعت في حب القلوب محبة

يأبى لها الإخلاص أن تتكدرا

In the innermost hearts you planted a love

whose sincerity refuses ever to be clouded.

وكفتك عن جر العساكر هيبة

أضحت تجر بكل أرض عسكرا

Your awe spared you the need to muster armies,

yet now it draws an army through every land.

وشفعتها بعزائم لولا التقى

أذكت على الآفاق جمراً مسعرا

You joined it to resolves that, but for piety,

would have kindled blazing coals across the horizons,

ووقائع أيدتها بصنائع

ضمن المديح لذكراها أن يشترى

and to battles brought about through acts of beneficence,

whose remembrance confers on praise the gift of being remembered.

نابت مناب الخضر في تطوافه

مذ فارقت هذا الجناب الأخضرا

Your battles stood in al-Khidr's stead in his wandering

whenever you were absent from this verdant court.

كم موقف أذكيت من شهب القنا

في ليل عثيره سنا وسنورا

How many a battlefield you kindled with meteors of spearheads,

making radiance and light in a night thick with dust.

ومواطن وطنت نفسها عندها

لما وردت الموت أن لا تصدرا

And how many stations where you made your soul stand firm,

once it found that death could not be guarded against.

فتكشفت من فارس الإسلام عن

ملك تعود أن يعان وينصرا

Thus you revealed, among the horsemen of Islam,

a king accustomed to aid and victory.

صدقت نعتك بالمظفر عندما

حمي الوطيس بها فرحت مظفرا

You proved the meaning of your epithet, "the Victorious," when

the battle blazed and you returned victorious—

حيث الأعنة والأسنة شرع

والجو قد لبس العجاج الأكدرا

where reins and spearpoints alike stood leveled,

and the air clothed itself in the murkiest dust.

وكأنك عزمك قال حين تقدمت

بك همة لم ترض أن تتأخرا

It was as though your resolve, when you advanced, declared—

borne on an ambition that refused to fall behind:

لا تكسر الأعداء حتى يشهدوا

صدر الذوابل في الصدور تكسرا

"Do not break the enemy until they witness

the shafts of lances breaking within their breasts,

والمشرفية لا يروق بياضها

إلا إذا صبغ النجيع الأحمرا

and until the gleam of Mashrafi swords pleases no eye

unless coursing blood has dyed it red."

بين الحديد على يمينك غيرة

حسد الحسام بها الأصم الأسمرا

Amid all that iron, the blade in your right hand was an ember,

and, jealous, it envied the dark spear.

فغدا لما نظم المثقف ناثراً

عقداً تمام جماله أن ينثرا

Thus, when the straightened spear had strung its line, it scattered

a necklace whose perfect beauty lay in being scattered.

فافخر بهمتك التي من حقها

إن لم يزعها مجدها أن تفخرا

So glory in your high resolve, which would have every right

to boast, were its own glory not holding it back.

وأرى السعود لها عليك وفادة

تصل الهواجر والدياجر والسرى

I see the auspicious stars arriving before you as a delegation,

joining scorching noons, black nights, and journeys by night.

ولو اقترحت على الزمان شبيبة

سلفت أتاك بها الزمان مبشرا

Had you asked Time to restore a youth

long past, Time would have brought it with glad tidings.

لم تحترق دار الخليج وإنما

شبت لمن يسري بها نار القرى

Abraham's house did not burn; rather,

what flared for the night traveler was hospitality's fire.

طلبت يفاع الأرض دون وهادها

فتوقدت في رأس شامخة الذرى

It sought the earth's highlands, not its low valleys,

and blazed atop a peak of towering summits.

طلعت طلوع النجم نال به الهدى

سار أضل طريقه فتحيرا

It rose like a star by whose guidance

a traveler who had lost his road escaped bewilderment.

ودليل ذلك أنها لم تشتعل

في الليل حتى رنقت سنة الكرى

Proof of this is that it did not kindle

at night until drowsiness had dimmed the eyes.

أو هل تزور النار ساحة جنة

أجريت فيها من نداك الكوثرا

Or would fire ever visit the precinct of a garden

through which you made Kawthar flow from your bounty?

الله فيك أبا الضياء سريرة

يجري بطاعتها القضاء إذا جرى

In you, Abu al-Diya, God has placed an inward grace

whose command destiny obeys whenever it runs its course.

فتمل دار شيدتها همة

يغدو العسير بأمرها متيسرا

So complete a house raised by lofty resolve,

at whose command the difficult becomes easy.

جملتها وتجملت مصر بها

لما علت بك عزة وتكبرا

You adorned it, and Egypt was adorned by it,

when through you its pride and grandeur rose.

فاقت على الإطلاق كل بنية

وسمت فما استثنت سوى أم

Unreservedly it surpassed every structure,

and climbed so high that only the Mother of Cities was excepted.

أنشأت فيها للعيون بدائعاً

رقت فأذهل حسنها من أبصرا

Within it you fashioned marvels for the eyes,

so delicate that their beauty stunned whoever looked.

فمن الرخام مسيراً ومسهماً

ومنمناً ومدرهماً ومدنرا

Its marble is veined and arrow-patterned,

fortified, figured like dirhams, and figured like dinars.

والعاج بين الأبنوس كأنه

أرض من الكافور تنبت عنبرا

Ivory amid ebony appears

like a land of camphor sprouting ambergris.

وسقيت من ذوب النضار سقوفها

حتى لكاد نضارها أن يقطرا

You drenched its ceilings with molten gold,

until their gold seemed almost to drip.

قد كان منظرها بهياً رائقاً

فجعلتها بالوشي أبهى منظرا

Its prospect was already splendid and pleasing;

then with embroidery you made the view still more splendid.

وكذاك جيد الظبي يحسن عاطلاً

ويروقك البيت الحرام مسترا

So too a gazelle's hide is beautiful when bare,

yet the Sacred House delights the eye when draped.

ألبستها بيض الستور وحمرها

فأتت كزهر الروض أبيض أحمرا

You clothed it in curtains of white and red,

until it seemed all garden blossoms, white and red.

فمجالس كسيت رقيماً أبيضاً

ومجالس كسيت طميماً أصفرا

Some halls were clothed in white patterned fabric,

and other halls in yellow brocade.

لم يبق نوع صامت أو ناطق

إلا غدا فيها الجميع مصورا

No kind of silent or speaking creature remained

but appeared there in pictured form.

فيها حدائق لم تجدها ديمة

أبداً ولانبتت على وجه الثرى

Within are gardens no rain cloud ever watered,

nor did they ever grow upon the face of earth.

لم يبد منها الروض إلا مزهراً

والنخل والرمان إلا مثمرا

Their meadows appear only in bloom,

their palms and pomegranates only laden with fruit.

والطير مذ وقعت على أغصانها

وثمارها لم تستطع أن تنقرا

The birds, from the moment they alighted on their boughs,

could not peck at their fruit.

وبها من الحيوان كل مشهر

لبس الوشيج العبقري مشهرا

There too is every celebrated kind of animal,

arrayed openly in wondrous brocade.

لا تعدم الأبصار بين مروجها

ليثاً ولا ظبياً بوجرة أعفرا

Across its meadows, the eyes never lack

a lion or a tawny gazelle of Wajra.

أنست نوافر وحشها بسباعها

فظباؤها لا تتقي أسد الشرى

Its skittish beasts have grown tame beside their predators,

for its marvels do not fear the lions of al-Shara.

وكأن صولتك المخوفة أمنت

أسرابها أن لا تراع وتذعرا

It is as though your awe-inspiring image assured

their herds that they need not be alarmed or startled.

وبها زرافات كأن رقابها

في الطول ألوية تؤم العسكرا

There are giraffes whose necks seem,

in their height, like standards mustering an army.

نوبية المنشأ ترك من المها

روقاً ومن بزل المهاري مشفرا

Nubian in origin, they have borrowed from the oryx

horns, and from the wild cattle of al-Mahari a muzzle.

جبلت على الإقعاء من إعجابها

فتخالها للتيه تمشي القهقرا

Fashioned to crouch upon their haunches in self-admiration,

you would think them, in their vanity, walking backward.

يا أيها الملك الذي اعتصمت يدي

منه بحبل غير منفصم العرى

O king in whom I have sought refuge,

holding through him to a rope whose strands cannot part,

وغدوت محسوداً على إحسانه ال

ضافي ومحسوداً عليه من الورى

I have become envied for his all-encompassing beneficence—

and envied by all mankind for having him.

حتى متى أنا في جوارك أكتري

داراً ودورك للأنام بلا كرى

How long must I, while under your protection, rent

a house, when your houses are free to humankind?

فامنن بها بالقرب منك فسيحة

فالقرب منك بنوم عيني يشترى

Bestow one upon me, spacious and near to you,

for nearness to you is purchased with the sleep of my eyes.

واجمع جواهر خاطر لو لم يغص

في بحر جودك لم يقل ذا الجوهرا

Gather the pearls of a mind which, had it not dived

in the sea of your bounty, would never have uttered this jewel.

فقر إذا فض الثناء ختامها

فضت على ناديك مسكاً أذفرا

Be assured: when praise's seal was broken open,

it poured fragrant musk upon your assembly.

تسقي العقول سلافة لم تعتصر

من بابل أبداً ولا من عكبرى

It gives minds a wine that was never pressed

in Babylon, nor ever in Ukbara.

روى منابت كرمها الكرم الذي

أضحى بينبوع الندى متفجرا

The generosity that watered the roots of its vine—

that which became a gushing spring of bounty—

شرب السماح بفارسي كؤوسها

فقضت على معروفه أن يشكرا

Munificence drank its cups from a Persian's hand,

and decreed that his beneficence must be thanked.

بدر بن رزيك الذي لا تتقى

هفواته في مجلس أن تبدرا

Badr ibn Ruzayk—whose impetuous sallies do not fear

to burst forth in an assembly—

صافي الطوية والسريرة لم يزل

ينهى دخيل الحقد أن يتوعرا

pure of heart and inward nature, has never ceased

forbidding hidden rancor to grow rugged.

نشرت جميل الذكر عنه طوية

أمرت عليه العدل أن يتأمرا

A sincere purpose within him spread fair renown abroad,

and commanded justice to rule as commander over him.

واستوجب الأجر الجميل بصورة

شكرت وقل لمثلها أن يشكرا

He earned the noble reward through a deed

that won thanks—few deeds like it ever do.

كم هاض من طاغ بها متجبر

ونهاه خوف الله أن يتجبرا

How many a tyrant, haughty and overbearing, did he subdue by it,

while fear of God restrained him from becoming overbearing.

وسرى بحسن صلاته وصلاته

مستصغراً ولبره مستغفرا

He journeyed on through the beauty of his benefactions and his prayers,

counting them small, and asking pardon even for his goodness.

وإذا تواضعت النفوس لربها

نالت بذاك تجارة لن تخسرا

When souls humble themselves before their Lord,

by that they gain a commerce that will never lose.

فليحي ما حييت مدائح مجده

وليبق مابقي الزمان معمرا

May the praises of his glory live as long as I live,

and may he remain, while time remains, long-lived.