1. My messenger, ask if she seeks intimacy
Or else the bending cane branch will help me

2. The sword is more apt to seek refuge in
Than what the eyes of gazelles can haul

3. I am the one time set out with
And the roads took shelter in my strides

4. I walk deceived, yet company me
Instead of men, the dainty and the docile

5. Neither wealth lures me nor
Does ransom free it, alms and ransom

6. Urgency hastens me to the farthest goals
A renter pushes me the respites

7. In a thicket they left their sitting
Slunk after night and hunkered down

8. When the bidding grew hot they
Sufficed with what the rattle allotted us

9. One with ringed ears, you'd think
A boulder cleaving his chest is a mountain

10. Haughty, his overtallness upright
A neck too short for his shoulders

11. I overstrained him and the pulley squeezes him
Water drips from his flanks

12. And a highborn the time set out with
After reason in her remained still

13. She split the howdahs of her mounts and slipped
Into desolation, her cheek helped by sands

14. She sought the Commander of the Faithful but
No grace turned to her nor a respite

15. Where the sublime is beyond doubt
And kindness unmarred by stinginess

16. And obedience hoped for, if praised
Are the hands of men, though few who ask

17. A king, when destriers hem him in
Stumbling increases and disasters abound

18. And when the dais carries his nape
Upon his palm the kisses rave

19. The Imams her merits obscured from
And entrusted her their light, the messengers

20. And when flaws marched to him, a face appeared
That gazes fell short before its grace

21. So glances hold back and venture
And words cease and reconnect

22. A man pledged to bliss to never
Let through his hearing a reproof

23. He meets tribulations, his face serene
And wades them though his heart a coward

24. His mirth hides his zeal
Like poison disguised by honey its taste

25. A folk whose swords were adornment
For those they struck and those they slew

26. With glory they robe those they plundered
And remembrance revive those they killed

27. You're bounty if hopes rise beyond limit
And you're refuge if transgression floods

28. With fault finders your hand launched at them
A piercing blow that makes the valiant wilt

29. You knew floods are held back
When downpours are prolonged by the rain

30. By God, your lance on the day you lunge with it
And waters no tumult nor silt to impede

31. The well-knit, straight shouldered horse
Waves can't make it sway, nor "short rope" its name

32. And two lancers when they block one another
They duel, for the spear there's zeal

33. The griffin swooped down on its prey
And went rolling it, the hyena's whoop

34. Two elders, this one's an undying hero
And that one's a spineless weakling

35. So when time wanted their measure
The thoroughbred snorted and the dapple shambled

36. You who seek excess of days, halt
Longing and haste from you recoil

37. Do you want the prides of glory when
No she-camel's in it for you, nor camel stallion?

38. So rein in your sheep away from the rutters
And leave the deluge to drench the camels

39. O closer of days against a dodderer
By his right, untouched by tremors his palsy

40. What you secured from frights will dwindle
And surety in the impregnable does not dwindle

41. For your friend, the world's a paradise
And for the mother of those who oppose you, a wasteland

42. If your enemy said of you a flaw
They said the sky, its skin's tanned

43. Beware bringing your enemy
Close through guiles and tricks

44. Be not duped by his composure even if
Words and deeds pleased you

45. For his heart's full of venom against you even
If dread made him cringe before you

46. Truly the one enamored with your love's a lad
Blame does not restrain him nor rebuke

47. Like Hussein, in his breast is
A heart that thinks of none but you

48. He praises you with all hidden knowledge
Eternally, the veil of the unseen drawn

49. That sword you prolonged its estrangement
And rarely its notches got

50. While you made it promises and hopes
Clung to them, twisted round hopes

51. So rally it in time of need and you'll find
A wrath making mountains fall short of it

52. And surrender the Commander of the Faithful when
Fray is joined and death's time due

53. Girded with the baldric of a realm
Wherein Creation's turns are curled

54. And delight on the feast day, and neither
Did the enemies delight nor perceive

55. So you're the vigil when they're asleep
Eternally, and you're the morning when they alight

56. A day cycles renew it and
Seasons gone by settled on it

57. And people on it distraught, reeling
Aching for shade, drunk on full

58. All that crowds of sorrows gathered in it
Joy's onrush scattered and undid

59. It's an occasion winter descended with
While summer sets out and migrates

60. And I am one who loves you even if
Canes and can whips fall down on me

61. The Ghalib tribes trod on my heel
And glories took to standing where I stood

62. And I gouged out the eye of stinginess since
Your gifts to me multiplied, the longnecked jars

63. And a lurker lies in ambush for my game
Then seizes it while I'm still rubbing the sleep away

64. I braved the torrent and passed its entirety
While my gown trapped the damp beneath me

65. And one reminding me a defiled kinship
Like the sun, its new born light the rim

66.
A womb clinging to one estranged as

67. The creeping bindweed clings, the trailing
Two that seize parts of my livelihood

68. While I who give freely and abandon decorum
My purpose in praising you is recalcitrance

69. In my days complies and makes peace with me
I stand improvising before you hindered

70. Neither by blindness nor misstep
Though all praise inclines to facets

71. Of my words and intimacy my amorous verse
Yet earth is mother to all dusts