1. My heart cannot gain from you what it hopes for
As being away from you for so long gives it solace

2. Ask the cupbearer about my frail body, but do not
Ask about my sickness, for it hides it

3. And do not ask anyone but my eyes about their tears
Take water only from its springs

4. I complain to God of passion I have kept secret
From the one who blames me as my tears reveal it

5. And a soul that has persisted in its misguidance
And increased until it persisted in its persistence

6. And fate struck me with its calamities
With every arrow of events to nurture it

7. As sustenance for a past time as if my luck
Supported me, I would have ransomed this time with it

8. This is an era that was not of eras
And the branded did not water it from its cisterns

9. Loyalty died and the sons of loyalty in it
So glory after them is weaker than its songs

10. Where is one who deserves praise offered to him
For money's sake, so we fulfill it and it fulfills us

11. I yearn for worthless verses I praised
One with, who if I lampooned, I would make lampooning him cheap

12. I yearn for the cloth of glory I donned, its scent dispersed
I clothed my misfortune with it, not one worthy of it

13. And a horizon of poetry whose softness melts rock
In which I revealed stars from its meanings

14. I inked it for a miser, the engraving of his dirham
May God protect it from the eyes of beggars

15. His forehead almost bows down to the dinar miserly
And worships it besides its Creator

16. He wishes he were deaf if a caller
Called him to good, to hear his caller

17. If the Chosen One came interceding for him
By the Trustworthy of God over a dirham, he would not give it

18. Neither praise tempts him to give his asker
Nor does blame turn him from deprivation

19. Prouder than a rooster walking haughtily
With two wings of arrogance and straying

20. No forbearance in him, no intellect or manners
No loyalty to guidance leads him

21. He aspires to highness while miserliness makes him sit
As if he is a bird whose wings are cut

22. He sees arrogance as the epitome of merits
And considers miserliness the height of glories

23. I wonder with all his insolence
Was he expecting revelation to come to him

24. I presented him, for my misfortune in his bliss
A necklace of praise, its beads appealing to him

25. The morning sun wishes it adorned itself with him
And the moon of night wishes it resembled him

26. Who will tell the flowers to portray his features
And the blossoms to equal him

27. And someone told me to lampoon him, so I said
Gently, my lampooning will not hurt him

28. I recite his equalities yet he reckons me
Due to his deep heedlessness, reciting his equals

29. My praising him was a sin I suffered with
So my lampooning him absolves me

30. O demolisher with his equalities a lofty edifice
Its builder is unmatched among earth's kings

31. Beware the fire of a thought whose flames kindled
And do not stand where torrents flooded its valley

32. For neither has the sword of my resolve erred when I wield it
Nor has the flint of my mind missed when I strike it

33. And I did not praise you hoping to gain wealth from you
But fate that flowed in the universe fulfilled it

34. And if I wanted riches, I would praise a lad
Whose praiser attains the utmost of his hopes