1. Take risks, for fortune favors the bold
Leave your homelands, migrate, be bold

2. Charge with your hands at every barren place
Where you linger for moments, hesitant and cold

3. A waterless desert, no gentle breeze blows
No specter or daydream passes through as visitor

4. Your steed becomes your subject there
And your companions are marked by their hooves and fur

5. If not approached by graceful gazelles
It would be safe from the butcher's blade

6. Nor would it know the stillness after din
Where the land is searched by the probing beak

7. O rider of steeds, a word of advice
That flies on the passing breeze

8. O you distracted by passion though flags
Of trade and protection stand tall and at ease

9. Be content with the longing that drives them
From the guide's favor and the deterring threat

10. Allow them a pause, if they shy
From the rocky path's scented breath

11. For they understand from the zephyr's stir
Missives heard through their flaring nose

12. See their necks inclined toward the breeze
With arched nostril and tilting nose

13. This is only because Nejd has remained
The refuge of dreams and thoughts

14. They yearn for it while the camels' resting place
Moves our souls and those of the camels too

15. We long for the meadows when away
And they long for the spring in the stony plain

16. Happy is he who carries on his back
The hidden passion within their minds

17. Happy is the coolness of travel by night
Whose dawn reveals the traveler's resting place

18. And a stop that brings together lover
Whose passion is quenched, and wandering lover

19. Where bonds are tied to purpose
And wakefulness meets the sleeping eye's restraint

20. Where apple blossoms above the valley
Nearly drip from the hissing vat's heat

21. Would that you saw the lambs when
I visited the gazelles and ostriches

22. When connection made coffee then
That gave drink to both from one cup passed

23. Difficulty was eased, neither lion of pomp
Feared, nor flock of ostriches took flight

24. The fiery colt's eyes had commands
That made imprisonment's rule proceed in fortresses

25. Beware of them when they unleash
Upon hearts arrows from their gaze

26. For they have no restraint as protection
Nor patience without them as shelter

27. Woe to them, what brutal arrows
Eyebrows of maidens and books of accounts!

28. If not for injustice, nothing would empower
The weak over the able

29. Nor would my like and I, so needy,
Become known among mankind as poet

30. As for assistance against me
Then I am not weak of aid

31. It does not harm me, though it fills my claim
Who is absent among my kin and clan

32. I am not fooled by the treachery of fickle time
If time betrays me with its custom

33. If I could turn back what has passed
I would return to the blooming days of youth

34. With smooth cheek meeting its visitors
Even if time frowned with sullen face

35. Monopolizing glory, but not withholding
Generosity's perfect gift

36. Familiarizing the wild praised one though aloof
Proclaim good tidings to him via eloquent messenger

37. And reach one darkened by his severity
Either by sea or by pouring cloud

38. None but you, crown of the caliphate, overstepped
And made glory dependent on the elements

39. You were not content that your soul did
What the best ships accomplished, and more

40. Your people are Ghassan, the finest
To claim lineage to chiefs and glories

41. Yet you refuse to count yourself
Among their finest descendants

42. That is only because they have a spirit
Independent of bonds of lineage

43. It eschewed the meadows of glory and spring
Whose gifts follow what has been sent forth

44. So it claimed for itself new virtues
That wring out the enviers' hearts

45. The people beneath them circle
And seek what each rising star attained

46. May Abu Dharrgam redeem each pretentious claimant
Who dares reach for the stars with hands too short

47. They claim no glory for their deeds
Their proof is digging up their graves

48. What pride is there in bones now obscured
Whose traces time's torrents have erased?

49. They gained of ascent and its path
Only pride in a fading imprint

50. So say to one who boasts of absent merit
Out of desire, or present merit if you prefer

51. For if you lack a witness to your ascent
Then reduce your claim and do not vie

52. O lion of faith, no need
Is worth stretching the abundant Euphrates

53. When the Banu Rizik stretched out
Their hands to you, towers brought down

54. And discerned from you sincere advice
Of pure hem and conscience

55. And tested your resolve in situations
That revealed the honor of allies

56. Your foe, the barren kingdom, still has
Treasures remaining in souls

57. They shared favors you thanked
Though the increased gift is due the thankful

58. So they sought refuge in enough from you
That has not ceased to grow in minds

59. If the nights flaunt their misfortunes
They shield with them the time's gaping wound

60. And if disaster strikes and they reflect
On whom their thoughts turned

61. They will make no pact but through him
Wherever the wrist's bracelet is clasped

62. He dazzled the world, burdened
With multiples of the deluded's measure

63. It mistakes the shine of tinsel in its clouds
For stars twinkling in the darkness

64. It trails its hem upon the earth's face
Whiter than white from cleansing

65. Visiting him from Damascus were three brothers
He honored them more than any guest

66. The mother of glories is barren of their like
And despair is better than the barren's hope

67. Whether they bless or condemn, they are but
A surge from the sea of abundant gifts

68. Through them stars rise in the sky of his hand
That adorn the shining full moon

69. When they stand around him as a planet
You would think them cubs of a slumbering lion

70. With arms like the claw of one whose grip
Is that of the mighty lion's grasp

71. Neither towering in height nor dwarfish
In stature, tracing lineage to nobility

72. From the spring of glory whose branches
Were hewn by the axe's blow

73. May God aid him with hands that have remained
Inheritance of trustee or prophet of purity

74. A miracle in Medina and Khaybar
That for him became proof's shining light

75. As if Moses and the trustee Haydar
Granted him the ample share

76. Blessing in his power and strength
That have become for him the firmest arms

77. He has none but them in any matter
And none but the sword's limit in counsel

78. A lion, when he leads the armies none
Returns from them but fingertips dyed red

79. He takes on terrors before his troops
Knowing virtue is for the initiator

80. His steed in war is a sanctuary for those
Who flocked to war from the barracks

81. How often have foes testified to him in fray
Of the expatriate fighter's deadly force

82. The cutting sword in his right hand
Against the executioner secures pardon

83. The spear swears by its length
It will probe the cuirass' depths

84. Its point in thrusting is a stronger composer
Its strike in hitting is a stronger scatterer

85. If you wish to truly know him
Observe him on the raging black night's eve

86. For if you see there a fierce assailant
None but he assails among them

87. Does the lion of faith hear my voice
Without peer or likeness?

88. Drawing from a heart that has not ceased
To subdue adversaries, mocking graves

89. Gems from my sea of thought that has not ceased
To enrich its essence with gems

90. Your fortune did not lack them for a moment
So do not face them with languid fortune

91. Outstripping, if the stars raced it
It would blanket them in the loser's dust

92. It excelled and reached after it the zephyr
So what say you of the tenth silent?

93. Mocking, its inward meaning distances
Though its outer meaning draws near the listener

94. A sorceress of meaning, and from her perfection
And beauty, the magic of eloquent speech

95. None of my words can harm her
Though she to me is sovereign

96. She spreads in generosity tongues
More fragrant than the scattering breeze's diffusion

97. Generosity remains no beautiful memory
Unless confined in a thankful tongue

98. So delight in a fast, you who are devoutest faster
Its days the buried, devoutest breaker of fast