1. For whom are tears shed at the abode of peace and right guidance?
Nay! How can tears avail amidst adversities?

2. I stood by them, heeding not the call of any summoner,
Nor hoping for an answer to my question.

3. O home of those I love! Over which the tracks of separation
And the caravans of trial and affliction passed!

4. Which living creature inhabited your valleys,
And which worn garment clad your nights?

5. Amid the twisting plaits a young gazelle,
Short of step, weak-pawed, and submissive.

6. A fawn, that if urged to talk, complains;
If invited to union, is slow to respond.

7. Can I then hope to draw near that gazelle
With her does and followers?

8. The wild cows of the abode have robbed me of my mind!
Alas, what have the wild cows to do with it, or I with it?

9. They torment me with the days of rendezvous,
And hasten me with the days of departure.

10. Rejections have left me confounded, though once
I was untroubled by rejections.

11. How can I be roused from heedlessness when my body is not erect
From affliction, nor is my heart tranquil?

12. Yearning draws me to you until
I incline from right to left like one drunk with wine,

13. Cup after cup, moment after moment.
Your memory gives me delight

14. As the loosening of fetters delights a prisoner.
The easiest matter I meet with is a care

15. That disorders me with its pure, limpid water,
Were it not for longing, I would not be so distracted,

16. Nor would my camel direct itself to a deserted encampment.
Yet I do not openly declare it, and then, were I to declare it,

17. I would not refrain from trying again.
I am the son of the branch at the top of the lofty Nizâr,

18. Who would weigh the lowly against the sublime?
Curb for me every refractory opponent,

19. Who allowed his obstinacy to roam freely to realms of honor.
They were a people who ruled over the necks of the ignoble,

20. And climbed the summits of glory.
When they unrolled their writs they dragged the train

21. Of their garments over men's necks.
If the houses of glory are portioned out, theirs is

22. The courtyard with pillars reaching to the sky.
Rougher than lions when contentious in argument,

23. Yet gentler than the eggs of ostriches if pleased.
Spending hands oppress them,

24. Though they have burdened the necks of men.
O sons of my uncle! Hardship from calamity has befallen my right side,

25. While none comes to my aid on the left.
I will requite your disavowal with forbearance,

26. If thoughts of disavowal creep into your minds.
Show me who can take my place amongst you!

27. Show me who can speak my words!
Who will protect the inviolable from enemies?

28. Who will cure the incurable sickness?
He will defend you on the day of death

29. And charge the foe on the day of battle.
I will attain the same by staying far from you -

30. No ropes can achieve what separation achieves.
He who cannot live amicably should be straightened

31. With retaliation and repayment in kind.
And I reckon that my triumph will benefit me

32. If to be harmed by others entails ignoring them.
I plot after my standards were raised high,

33. And my mountains fixed firmly in their positions,
And glory tightened its tent-pegs for me

34. And extended its ropes on all sides,
And your eminence was completed in me, after a deficiency,

35. As the perfection of the full moon after its crescent phase.
Nor do I excel my people by any artifice,

36. As a pod excels others with no trickery.
If I attained the glories of my father it was

37. The spark that came from that kindling.
For whom is the rain except for the valleys?

38. And for whom is the light except for the crescent moon?
I guard my words from men, and am open-handed with men in my wealth.

39. Many biting arrows have wounded my heart more sharply than spears.
I showed patience, and did not counter the speaker with words,

40. So my only answer to him who spoke was action.
Some have competed with me for the heights;

41. Little did they know that they are all mine!
If I gained the stars in their loftiness,

42. I have still preserved some of my possessions.
I swear by that parcel of fallen walls,

43. The crevices of dormice and sand rat,
Whose buildings are humbled, whose pillars have crumbled,

44. Assaulted by the passage of caravans,
Facing the Sacred House (in Mecca), exposed

45. To the pouring of lawful bloodshed.
So let this night destine for me one

46. Disheveled, dust laden, enveloped in darkness,
Light of belongings, whom his career preoccupies,

47. Keeping him from thoughts of decline and decay,
And aspiring to the heights, until he surpasses

48. The reach of any other aspirant.
And if I do not stand in these heights,

49. Then ravens will lament over my grave at evening...