1. Time has created qualities in you, for how long will it last?
My hair has shown me plainly that matters are serious.

2. My youthful ringlets accompanied me to the age of forty,
Then their blackness, which colored my life, began to fade.

3. I have never complained of the turning of my fate,
Even though my lifetime with it has declined and wasted away.

4. O whiteness of old age, weep for the nights of my youth
That you darkened when they were bright.

5. O the sauntering of a gazelle, capricious and playful,
While my time with her bounded and cavorted.

6. Never before her did I show affection or draw near a brunette,
Nor keep away from a blonde out of disdain.

7. When I reached the fullness of forty years,
Her knotted locks began to come undone.

8. My diminishment was revealed when she reached perfection,
And I felt my weakness when she attained full growth.

9. The eyes turned away from me as the gaze turns away
From a wounded gazelle stumbling blindly on.

10. Would that one night that we visited the lowlands as a pair,
Even in turmoil and distress!

11. And servers giving us cooled wine in the heat,
Who replaced our thirst with health and coldness.

12. My friends left, glorying in pilgrimage,
While my isolation prides itself on parsimony.

13. My clothes are restrictions of modesty,
So I seem to have lost nobility in them.

14. O Lord of a night between travel and encampment
When we put on our garments out of destitution!

15. And tents pitched on the side of Uhud
Whose peak please build up, O Lord, anew!

16. Nothing remains for my soul in Tihama
When I seek rest there, I yearn for Nejd.

17. Slumber relieves the confusion of an eye
That cannot find wakeful wisdom in petition.

18. I slept hoping for India - whatever dream
Imagined for me was naught but India.

19. Strange is my longing for the nights' affection!
Their nature has harmed me and plotted against me.

20. They whispered to themselves and were chaste,
For no lover welcomes your company.

21. The scratching of fate flayed me,
So it discarded me, smooth-skinned.

22. Each day I blame my life, but if tomorrow passes,
I will say "Thanks" for it.

23. Sighs at fate - if I gain breath from them,
I add more fuel and stoke their heat.

24. O my blind fortune! Does it not meet
A guide who seeks reward and so is guided?

25. O time of hypocrisy! May God increase the distance
Between me and the people of your abode.

26. Who can excuse me from the company of people? It did not
Conceal its shameful nature and fouled our pact.

27. How many brothers roamed with me, how many friends were true!
But when circumstances parted us, they turned away.

28. And a noble friend whose days were fortunate -
When they ended he recoiled, curled up.

29. Would that he had not favored me with justice
So that time might treat me fairly and show me love!

30. And when you find no escape from patience,
Withdraw yourself, and escape the people.

31. God will defend me and protect me from the companion
Who rejects me, just as He fulfilled it for me once before.

32. Men's faces have frowned, but never did I reject
A face of radiant cheer and roses.

33. Whenever my ambitions opposed His will,
Rebellion was the constant disorder.

34. Kindness has ruled; when talk of wealth
Distracted it from comfort, it gave generously and helped.

35. Increase your stubbornness if you ask, and insist
Upon Him - it will give you more patience and provision.

36. You will never see, though water is given and flows,
Any hoof made dirtier in its course.

37. Whenever worldly greed was displayed before it,
It refrained virtuously, with detachment.

38. The people have multiplied its wealth and gained it,
Provisions that ennoble discourse and merit praise.

39. A spirit that did not limit excellence reached
The heights of glory but did not attain any limit.

40. It reckoned destitution a possession of virtues
And the passing of time in might an eternity.

41. A father who, had he wished, could have surpassed
The heavens' realm, transcending its bounds.

42. Of the Abbasids who cultivated the world’s plumage
And nurtured its bones and skin -

43. Their hands suckled it, a precious pearl,
And watered its slopes and valleys.

44. Between a throng of them and Sapor were generations
Who reckoned the birth of time as false.

45. They took the excuse of fate in hand and blocked
The passes of oppression, hunting lions.

46. The course of justice in their achievements is narrated,
While the excellence of their management is lauded.

47. And when the years grew gloomy and the earth
Showed its dusty face in decay,

48. They dispelled decline through prosperity and restored
The condition, leaving monuments behind them.

49. They crowned an embryo and their descendants in maturity
Succeeded the elders of the people as youths and beloveds.

50. Time enumerated chief after chief among them,
And al-Husayn a grandfather - and so a chief.

51. It prevented people from competing with you in generosity,
Their winding course, while your course is direct.

52. And it protected the kingdom from stumbling in opinion;
You administered its affairs with total control.

53. You have a day from it of settlement with war
That throws back early Advancements completely routed.

54. Upon it you ride fate like a mount, on its back,
Into victory, taking the nights as soldiers.

55. A day in which you see the destitution of visitors
As obstinate adversaries through your decree.

56. Every unbroken colt, your eloquence in its track
Overtakes it - the thoroughbred overtakes the dapple-coat.

57. I am that freeman whom your sorcerous qualities
Have made your slave, O prince, through passion!

58. Suspended by love for you, my hands tied
With a rope - distance only adds another knot.

59. Longing has controlled my heart; since separation came between us
Stretching far, I complain of remoteness though it is unjust.

60. Were it not for the sweetness of nearness I would not suffer distance.
Would that one who carries the weak into danger

61. Would convey my camel litter to you and guide it!
My eyes would gain relief, even for an hour with you,

62. For after it I will not glance again.
And in estrangement, so the rhymes convey

63. Greetings to you from me - they pass by night and day.
Every maiden who outshines the sun in brilliance

64. And conceals the embers of night in her face's glow,
Whose body is untouched by any hand,

65. Nor has the delicacy of her glances been made common -
The dangles of her necklaces were offered to you;

66. To the springtime it offers roses.
From her the greeting and longing come to you -

67. One is complained of, the other pleasant to receive.
Visit the beauty of her neck with my ring,

68. And tailor an ornament for the feast night.
And accept from fate what it has often rejected

69. And tossed over its shoulder in reversal.
I do not care if I lose you, but when

70. My eyes behold you, I see no loss.