1. O beauty of life, your charm makes the lovesick sing
If only you could heal my aching heart with a kind glance

2. Your gaze gave me more anguish, fueling the fires in my liver
It would not have harmed you to give me more provision

3. As for my heart, it has become your captive
Oh what an ill-fated heart that has no ransom

4. They made false promises, and promised in love,
A beautiful promise, but did not keep the appointment

5. How can I escape when in my heart you have pierced
Two opposing daggers of fear and separation

6. We spend our days high up on the mountain slopes
While the tribe camps on the plains and valleys below

7. It would not trouble you, though our houses are close,
That estrangement did not allow us to settle

8. If you were to grant me my wish, it would be a blessing,
and your generosity would bring me aid and happiness

9. I will never forget, when she left, taking
my love away in the impending separation

10. The smooth-cheeked gazelle, her braids
shine like carnelians in the early dawn light

11. She jokingly said, “I ransom my life for you,”
I ransom my soul for that joking redeemer

12. Umma has grown miserly with her gifts
So your heart has gotten used to her evil habits

13. Since she revealed her fickle nature,
your heart is like one made sick by yellow bile

14. Slain by the crocodiles in the water, herself a murderess,
you see the swimmer beside her losing his way

15. And youths every barren outcast flashed at them,
every smooth-sided flatterer enticed them

16. Passionate she-camels hurry them away,
straying confusedly in the wasteland

17. As if they were ostriches fleeing Ghost Forest,
streaking wildly across the sand dunes

18. They are inspired to sing the son of Mirdas,
till they are transported and sing with the singers

19. A king crowned over the kings of the earth,
his ambition divided between initiative and income

20. We visited Al-Mu’izz, so we visited a prince of Mudar,
an ocean of dew, a flame of life and activity

21. The lovers in their passions sing his praises through the night
for his merit, and for rescuing and helping me

22. A youth, when the archers seek their prey,
they guide well-trained trackers and archers

23. Dazzling white, radiant, he receives delegations smiling,
with brilliance like the rising sun’s rays

24. By him, caravans and those astray in darkness are guided,
may God not remove that rightly-guiding leader

25. A lofty, splendid palace built for them in ancient times
by Ka’b ibn ‘Abd and Idris ibn Shaddad

26. Not every people who boast of their own excellence
boast of their ancestors and forefathers

27. You see clothes upon their bodies, and see
those clothes upon the frames of lions

28. When they unsheathe them they unsheathe them from their shoulders
as you would unsheathe polished swords from scabbards

29. If you meet them, you meet a noble company
whose hearts in calamities are unlike other hearts

30. It is as if they and the horses they ride
are borne by pillars of forbearance atop pillars

31. When angry, they have the sharp scent of mint,
slashing with Indian swords at the provisions

32. O son of kings, may God give you protection
accustomed to righteous deeds, untiring

33. How many favors I owe you brought fruit from my labors
and multiplied across the face of the earth despite enviers

34. I will repay you with odes penned in saffron,
as if they were collars placed around steeds’ necks

35. Remaining through the dust of days undying,
like memories of you lasting in settled lands and wastelands