1. Standing looking at the ruins is this observer,
Suffering illness is enough for him that he stayed up with you.

2. Give him back what glistened in his glance,
Your cheek and the fresh, leafy branch.

3. So you are safe from any blamer blaming you
For the excess of love, or any admirer deluding you,

4. This is separation, and you know more of passion,
So beware - the days of the lover are fickle.

5. I ransom anyone who made the sanctuary of love lawful
So it was entered openly by riders and walkers.

6. I fear to meet you stealing a glance
That gives birth to fidelity, though its mother is barren.

7. In my cares, I tried to be distracted,
But imagination's vision came to me unbidden.

8. Today, distance has judged in its decrees,
So it is as if the means to fidelity are crimes.

9. These abodes whose winding paths
The early cloud avoided, leaving them desolate,

10. A land where I say to the wild cows roaming it:
If I stumble, my heart has caused me to stumble.

11. She said, as my tears flooded my cheeks:
What has time, ceaselessly turning, done!

12. I turned my face from the beloved out of nobility
And showed him that my eyelids are breakers.

13. Come to me, it is enough for me a glance by which
I look my fill, for its resting place is al-Husayn's brilliant face.

14. Were the new moon to adorn his brow,
Thoughts and glances would throng to kiss it.

15. The clouds draw near, so before long they will fold
Their shadowy folds around your wide, raining courtyard.

16. If you travel by land, the solitudes are gathering places,
Or lead horsemen, then the saddles are pulpits.

17. O son of great ones, you stayed nowhere
But that the mention of you flows free with generosity.

18. You never traveled until the fame of your description went first,
Then you followed it, though your care was for what comes after.

19. The rains poured to you through the knot of the rope,
For the clouds are enchanting wherever they go.

20. Your mount abases itself wherever you travel, as if
The smooth-gaited camel was charged by the jerboa and hedgehog to serve you.

21. It does no harm to one who drinks the dove's water despite himself,
Frightening him - while you subdue it.

22. Do not ever try to strike the staff of enemies,
For you are equal to whatever brings humiliation.

23. I traveled my time but did not reach any goal
Before praise flowed free of me though I did not seek it.

24. I accompanied the days of love and saw them
A pasture whose people were maidens and chaste women.

25. And I saw the greatest sight I ever saw
Contended over by one who commands and one who forbids.

26. After love, I regretted obeying it
And disobeyed my resolves, which are commands.

27. I weep for the days while they laugh
In another's face, and he wanders among them confused.

28. If an eyelid had turned white, my black-eyed glance
Would have turned white from all the events I have witnessed.

29. Or if this sun were to change color one day
It would dye my hair from all the time I have been deprived.

30. Or if the sociable were to make friends with the desolate one day,
The ostrich that avoided flowers would pasture there.

31. Glory is only in traveling, and praise only
In homelands, while the one who stays behind is the loser.

32. Tomorrow I will walk my stallion between Hatitat
And Wadaika, which no rain saturates,

33. Its lips bleed and its mouth drips thickened blood
While the hooves knock together bones.

34. And night spreads out its arriving wings
Until it hurls us into sleep while fleeing.

35. Bay horses as if their eyes in their forelock
Were hearts that turned away from blossoms.

36. When they cross the water of a valley, its width spans
Them like racing mares.

37. To you the excellent horses went lightly,
Tribes and buildings are rounded up by them.

38. They bear lovers intoxicated when they traveled;
Beneath the darkness, graves were lifted up to them.

39. They shared the afflictions of their pacing mount
So it was as if the packs atop them were also burdened.

40. If you tasked them, the turns of time would have come to you
Panting as they sped to you.

41. With your patience as the gazelles separate
Between valleys and the canyons, contending.

42. Today is blackened by its night
Veils and curtains protected you from it.

43. Where the birds' way was closed off
Until the ostrich shepherded whatever was in the reserves.

44. The sun's cheek took from it a black stain,
And the light testifies that your face is radiant.

45. A day when the fledglings wish their chests
Could tally what your hands have done as girths.

46. The captives push their palms into their purses
Set against what they pushed away of spear and sword points.

47. So the women have tatters of rent clothing
And the men have forgiveness for the little they possess.

48. They turned, covering their heads with their hands,
As if those palms were shovels.

49. You sacrificed the bodies of the champions to the wild beasts
So they knew you were supreme among them.

50. Where do you wed when the meadows are empty
For the camels of your camel herd, and the wild beasts roam free?

51. When you make peace, the poisons are streaming;
When you make war, the soft winds flee.

52. As if your spear is one that drinks the blood of heroes
And your sword one that slaughters skulls.

53. If the spheres knew I was your son,
They would not be pleased that I am allied to the heavens!

54. It is enough, by your generosity, that I praise you,
And enough, by my glory, that I pride myself on you.

55. The one graced by my praises,
Which clothed him in virtues and glories, was prompted by passion.

56. Praise of his noble traits proliferated in praising him
As if his eloquent praiser was chatting idly.

57. He guaranteed eternity by his own self, so if
This age vanished, time past would restore him.

58. Today, how many hopes rest in his chest to reward you
And how many backs bent in weakness to thank you!

59. O company of the young in their prime
My praises reach you while ancestral deeds are remembered.

60. I was pleased for you to be praised in time
And your ascent does not please me to be a poet!