1. A love who has kept his distance, so separation's snakes bite him,
Yet he finds no solace with those who know sorrow and pain.

2. The radiant one tore off the robe of intimacy in grief,
And so he was stripped bare, with it wrested from him.

3. Each day his intense torment sends him a jinniyyah
Who promises consent from the beloved, only to fell him.

4. My friend, you've left me at daybreak, excusing yourself,
A cup passed round and round again in my misery.

5. Leave me to gallop on love’s heels awhile,
Till fourfold weariness falls away from me.

6. I commend to God in the land of Hijaz a secret:
A garden lodged in the heart, its place and bounds.

7. If remoteness enlarges my heart through its torment,
Then suckling’s breast has gone slack giving milk to me.

8. No love was built up for him from me, nor tenderness
Lavished on him, now squandered, lost to me.

9. But he has tempted me into error I cannot counter,
Blocking my desire in ways hurtful to me.

10. Tempted, tempted me to harm me, taxing his strength,
Never content with life’s sweetness he gulps down.

11. Commissioned to reap good, he harvests it,
Never espying in reason what he might sow.

12. Judging as he fancied, I found him erratic,
Hearing from him what words I used to hear.

13. I took comfort I might die, placed as he was,
Since he lacked all self-restraint to curb him.

14. By God, O passion, treat my heart gently, for
More than you do, I cannot bear.

15. What consolation for one whose love lies west
While his body makes its home east in Fustat?

16. A love sleep carried off, leaving my eyelids,
And tears now flow in its wake, mourning it.

17. As for you, O union, be quick to join us in our land of parting,
Where unity of power gathers itself whole.

18. Give him to drink from proximity’s flagon,
For he is abased, his place folded up.

19. May the nights with their encampments gone before
Return to us in a return without farewell.

20. How many a crescent moon we left arising
Where it eclipsed the cares of the soul as it rose.

21. Its sky cupped us away from cared by it,
Outstretched toward the cord of patience it severs.

22. The scent of us blew about, coming and going
Over the seats of an encampment whose range lies waste.

23. A scent—and it is the very wind—so let it waft gladness,
A commerce, before loss without gain.

24. Die by it the death of one life might be hoped for,
So the dead by scent revive in their burial-ground.

25. Fate's hidden hoards were in its treasures,
And it freely gave what it used to refuse.

26. As if it were afterglow, with mingling
Lending it an unseen cloud without clearing.

27. A blamer blamed me for ignorance, so I said:
"For youth I have an excuse none can rebut."

28. "For me, so turn your blame aside, a heart displayed, laid open,
In passion's doctrine, O you who parade it."

29. "And the beloved of Imam al-Husayn follows it,
Our pact upon us in a face no turning aside can shake off."