1. Between the passes, in the cleft of stone
A dark-skinned woman watches for the canal’s flow

2. She threaded her necklaces with what she shed
Of a flood of tears or freely flowing blood

3. Whatever you wished of hearts’ love or
Of lids, white or rosy

4. She came down rejecting the first of the three sites
And so performed a funeral for the night of departure

5. She climbed for fourteen moons
While the month barely fulfilled the tenth

6. She casts pebbles, and between our ribs
A goal for her, which she casts with embers

7. Who is for me, for my misery, a virgin
Who has matured as my age has matured

8. She has not intended in any oath she swore
Except if she swore to estrangement

9. She said, “My body craved a feast,
My eyes, for their sickness, are my excuse.”

10. And she was made to drink to quench her thirst
So she invoked the signs about wine

11. And she says to the rebuker, chiding,
“He has grayed me without realizing it.”

12. I kissed, deliberately, his frowning mouth
So his mustache exceeded my lips

13. And a brother, among my companions
In ease and hardship and ill

14. She folds his coarseness into his smile
Ribs gaping over embers

15. My Master, events are sheathed
So if you rise, see them burst forth

16. Weary of preserving my right hand
Until he counts them in hardship

17. Time is more gentle with me, granting me shelter
If only it would leave me with time

18. And he who clouds kindness deceives me
With the flashing of his smiling face

19. He settled the winds and kindled for them
A fire he fans but does not light

20. One of ready wit for gratitude
And foolishness in gratitude’s cycles

21. So when I praise, I praise a pouring rain
And when I squeeze, I squeeze from rock

22. No soul enjoys success, nor
Does affection churn the chest’s cream

23. And he wanted me without his wealth
To make myself content with poverty’s bliss

24. He would be saved by my honor were
The expanse of the desert and the heat of noon to fault him

25. And time fulfills what it promised
In the like of him and the fruits of patience

26. And the Sultan’s supporter exalts
His hand by supporting and aiding me

27. If I wished, I could unravel the planets’ mysteries for him
And hide the blossoms from their sight

28. And glory would carry me swimming
On its back though it is no child of the back

29. It rests for the ponds, wading,
And struggles in the deep diving

30. The winds blow according to their will
Deeming themselves birds in their blowing

31. And if their sails are unfurled for them
They flutter with two swooping eagles

32. On one side, smooth, which repels them
While their danger is on the rugged side

33. The scolders spur on the racing camel
As it is driven with chanting and praise

34. Who is for me a heart above them remembering
Listening to my love ode, obedient to my order?

35. They said courage is but delusion
Of time and fate drawn near

36. Two days in a bay, so if they exceed
It is by the night of the full moon

37. Alas! For me is a barren coast
While the sea empties me into the sea

38. Purpose and purposeful are alike
In generosity or the limit of downpour

39. I am nothing but the owner of a palm,
Briny, and that a trickle of rainwater

40. He raced the kings, so he betrayed them; a king
Outstripped the wild beasts in their prime

41. And I see, though he is sixty’s son, their incapacity
In opinion, and he is the son of twelve

42. Not one made delicate by luxury
Is troubled by it, nor the newly proud of pride

43. From my lofty inheritors, none have seized
Glory by force or ruled it by conquest

44. Lords of a household of nobility tied
Its tent ropes in early time

45. They set their determination upon the nations
And shared in prohibition and command

46. In every horizon is a flag of theirs
Pasture for the helpless and fortress of the breach

47. The children of the generous, and it is knowledge
Whose name they championed by spurning wealth

48. They dwelt, and their bounty flowed, resembling
An erected sea while its kingdom marches on

49. In every house of theirs is the living’s trace
In the desolate town and neglected ruin

50. And you, O honorable one, attained their goal
Which the shooting stars have no merit in

51. You increased their glory, and one of them
To his father is as the waw to amr

52. They closed the raids, you alone,
So you filled the ranks of the dense cavalry

53. And the darkness of opinion was murky among them
So you shone in it with the dawn’s first light

54. And your father, the day of Basra, their peaks confessed
To his terrible swords

55. He cast a staff of resolute will that split
Its signs to the limit of docked tails

56. It clasped the Karaji with what undid
His hands of plots and cunning

57. So he went choosing for himself disgrace
Base, of killing and capture

58. He finds fleeing most beloved for now
If the strangerhood of death were repelled

59. And Oman and its people saw in you what
Enriched the poor and secured the afraid

60. Through your generosity, though lonely, it became
A beloved destination of delegations and travel

61. One made joyous by his fortune comes to you
Disconsolate in kindness and righteousness

62. Distracted by possessions’ bliss, he guards it
From the bliss you guarded of remembrance

63. Seeking your downfall, though laboring
Like the night, seeker of the moon’s stumble

64. I have told, when the slanderer clamored against me,
The fair-handed are more honest in poetry

65. Leave the abodes of the lofty to him
Lagging, for the chest is for the chest

66. O complainant, though hoping for his bounty
I have replaced magic and sacrifice for me

67. Are you an arbitrator against me? Your vow to me
For I have fulfilled the wishes I vowed to you

68. Days I have, and singular loyalty, while for
All people are betrayal and treason

69. And I see your hand today among some
Who did not share that age

70. Return my hand filled, and forbid those who
Disparage your bounty from a sallow hand

71. Bestow on me as you have decided, let me taste
Your sweetness and bitterness

72. And dress yourself in fine garments
Time’s arrows do not know them

73. Misfortunes are blinded from beholding them
And lengthen in them the slumber of intoxication

74. However much people renew creation, its essence
Grows with stirring and publishing

75. And listen to me, at each occasion of fullness
The sleepers' eyes, a virgin's anklets

76. The weaving of talent is the dress of its ornament
And its jewelry of thought's making

77. As though the merchants had brought with it
For you from fragrant Sohar

78. Ears grow accustomed, though hindered
By gravity, until I see you and your earrings

79. Both diamonds to the Pleiades and eagle
This gift overwhelms me,

80. And justice is upon you in the bride-price