1. Indeed, gray hair has made speech eloquent, summarized it
And made it universal to all people, specifying it

2. And warned us with the warning of the best advisor
When he presented good advice purely and sincerely

3. So honor through it an intimate, loyal and preaching friend
Pious, pure, truthful in speech, sincere

4. So here is my graying and aging summarizing
The knowledge of rhetoric tomorrow explaining and summarizing

5. By your life, when my hair whitened and my parting
I listened to a special, specified meaning

6. And no meaning of misguidance was obscured to me
Though before its meaning had been blind to me

7. Sleepers, awake! Life is but fleeting
And do not feel safe from a thief who has become emboldened

8. Do you seek longevity from this time?
Yet lo, the shadow of life for you has diminished

9. The passage of time has revealed to you its hidden secret
And displayed clearly the darkness of truth, articulating and enunciating

10. Blessed is one who has obeyed its sermons
And woe to an ignorant man who has disobeyed its command

11. Life's prime has been marred by worries and sorrows
So life was not sweet for a man until it became bitter

12. The drink of pleasure was never palatable to any drinker
Until after that it was spoiled

13. Do you dance, slaughtered by the dagger of passion?
What a bird you are, for whom slaughter is but dancing

14. O ignorant one, who has wasted a precious fate
You have squandered a precious destiny cheaply

15. Do you know the price of that which you have sold
To be ignorant of a cunning ploy and make cheap

16. You have sold hope for despair and light for darkness
And equated the sublime with the lowly and jewels with pebbles

17. You have increased until there is no increase over what
You have diminished in weight, though it was not already insufficient

18. The world extends to you its deceptive snares
With pleasures that have become constricting for you

19. By your life, the greedy one continues to incite
Love of the deceitful world, avaricious

20. Man must inevitably descend into the earth
Even if he ascended above the stars toe-tip

21. And he who divorces the world completely, its hated love
Will not cease to lurk for him

22. He who is not tested by the tribulation of an affliction
Will not be saved, and from its harms not escape

23. When a man is cleansed of the leprosy of sin
That is the most pure, even if he was a leper

24. He who discards the garb of his transgressions is successful
And dresses in the robe of a penitent, repentant

25. I have seen from the days what has frightened me
And awakened the senses of my mind, making them vigilant

26. I have abstained from the deception of a time that made me
Stingy through its stinginess, and praise be to God, most stingy

27. I spent therein fifty-five years
With abundant sins, increasing in number, countless

28. I disdained my life after it sapped my strength
My gray hair, in which I needed a cane to walk

29. So God decreed I face judgment
With the fairest judgment, either destroying or saving

30. So there is no refuge but in Him who is my goal
For I do not see in other than Him a savior for me