1. Baghdad called out with my defences, so I grew fond of it
My roaming around on the backs of horses and camels

2. And whenever it would stir me from its dwellings
I would face it with gardens not perturbed

3. Its inhabitants overwhelmed me though I cared not
And did as I wished though not commanded

4. A ruler threatened me with banishment from my homeland
But I was not created for anything but saddle and camp

5. Though it gifts me with what I cannot resist
Still I survived and my flask unfilled

6. Impatiently I don my face behind every shelter
While the land lies bare of gazelle and mountain goat

7. And many a dark-eyed damsel stirs me
With a tearful gaze full of dew

8. Lower yourself to me for sorrows have a sanctuary
And one gripped by grief cannot be blamed

9. So I said alas the complainer hears me not
Grief is only understood on the day of Ashura

10. The day the spears tore the son of Fatima
The flowing robes of the two sacred sanctums ripped

11. He fell to death with no hand to shield him
Except being trampled by galloping steeds

12. Thirsty, the stabs of the spears quenched by
A drink of cold water mixed with camphor

13. As if the eggs of ostriches tore him
A fire controlling a body of light

14. Cast before God on the hot sands, seized
By the mouths of predators amidst preparation and resolve

15. The gazelles shaded him, covering him
From sights with the tails of storms

16. The beasts feared nearing his corpse
As he lay unburied for three days

17. The place where the blows poured on him
Brought calamities through plots

18. A rectangle across time, which it precisely measured
Time reaped its due rewards from it

19. Inciting the son of Ziyad, evil is his being
His endeavour to Yazid ingratitude

20. He wished to avoid the consequences of his hands' deeds
But that was an unamendable loss

21. The Prophet's daughters were made captives among them
While the defenseless religion lay bare

22. If death takes from us Ibn Munjiba
Then oft has it returned to lick its fingers

23. It meets the spearheads with a forehead its surface carved
The spearheads amidst blood and grime

24. After having repelled the spear tips with it
A heart spacious, an opinion unrestrained

25. Its train drags on its robes and it has upon the gazelle
A flank unpierced

26. In a coat of mail whose links shine like eggs
You'd think it a lightning flash dangling on the dunes

27. O Banu Umayya, do the swords sleep
Sheathed away in the earth's far reaches?

28. While the blades coil in their scabbards
And the racers flex their muscles on the track

29. I watch for a day with no secrecy
Each hidden one anxious of it

30. And the swords have their fill of necks
A drink unspoilt

31. Each day the Prophet's House has a moon that sets
Plunging with the sound of calamities and disasters

32. And each day for them a pure whiteness
Which time spoils with finesse and murk

33. The lairs of a people, death is wary of their hands
Morning and night they are prey for raiders

34. I have not wondered at my sorrow and loathing
For grief is an unstitched wound upon my heart

35. With which eye shall I look upon the High One, if
Mine are blinded and I make excuses?

36. I meet time with words that know no respite
A lifetime and a heart feeling no tranquility

37. O noble ancestor, still I have a care stirring me
To tears and a longing unconsoled

38. And shedding tears spurs on a sleepless eye
More than pulling away and leaving

39. Surely consoling myself is forbidden to my liver
And no consoling for a heart is forbidden