1. A seductress, caressed by slender waists,
greeted me affectionately with words.

2. If it was an invitation, do not hesitate,
and if it was farewell, then goodbye.

3. If only she had wished me well that morn of parting
as they loaded up tents on camel litters.

4. I would have glimpsed, with one glance, her tent ropes coiled,
and the well-set pegs and posts.

5. Her veil glowed like embers scattered in the dark,
as if gems and rubies adorned her soft neck.

6. She approached her gazelle and leaned toward me –
I saw grief below her beautiful braids.

7.
She led it gently, turning it back

8. toward late afternoon, away from dawn.
As if it were a cup of Bosran wine

9. whose seal fate had secured.

10. The kneading feet carried it from the Rabi’s house
to Luqman in a standing market.

11. When its seals were opened, it overcame
the sober in their revelry.

12.
The tax collectors, with terrible growls,

13. kissed its frothing lips through the clouds.
So it lay in vessels, cooled

14. by the south wind blowing on skin.

15. It relishes the taste and imagines,
when awakened after sleep.

16. So leave it be, now that it wanders far
and is lost in passion away from you.

17.
But what came to you from Ibn Hind

18. regarding perfected, clear resolve –
No shoe is too much for me to give

19. to the most ambitious hero.

20. It means tribes, furious
against the creeping lowlanders.

21. Marching with a man who shuns weakness
and undertakes great tasks –

22. Helped against the enemy on all sides
by a twisting band in the sky.

23.
And a swarthy fleet courser he rides

24. whose teeth are like a blade that cuts.

25. And the messenger told him some news –
that a tribe is encroaching from unlawful lands

26. And that the people are fully supporting each other,
group aiding group in the battle.

27. So he drove them into the belly of darkness, disheveled,
their pace like that of a female ostrich.

28. On the trail of guides and spies
and refugees fleeing Damascus.

29. They spent the night still while he crept
ever closer through the perfect dark.

30. At dawn he surprised them with whistling arrows
as if their heads were ostrich eggs.

31.
Death tasted those it fell upon

32. while the survivors bore lasting scars.

33. They were like sheep on the sand
smoothing their tails along the ground.

34. Instructing the storytellers, when they reminisce,
to speak of an unwanted weaning.

35. And at dawn he was shining on Jabal Hims
with swirling dust and gathered darkness.

36. Those who sought to catch him were intent,
though not for the purpose they pretended.