1. My father, what misfortune awaits me,
While the rope and executioner wait for me.

2. This book comes to you from a prison cell,
With rocky, solid walls.

3. Only one night remains for me to live,
And I feel its darkness is my shroud.

4. It will pass, my father, I have no doubt,
And after it they will carry my corpse.

5. The night around me is a deadly calm,
And memories stir in my conscience.

6. My pain quiets me, so I recite my comfort
In a few verses of the Quran.

7. And my soul between my ribs is transparent,
Devotion has crept into it and shaken my being.

8. I have lived believing in God but never tasted
Until now the sweetness of faith.

9. And the silence is broken by the clanking of chains
Fiddled with by the warden's fingers.

10. In the time between one moment and the next
Satan peers at me with his eyelids.

11. From a hole in the door he watches his prey
And returns safely to pacing around.

12. I feel no grudge towards him,
What wrong has he done to earn my hatred?

13. He is good-natured like you, my father,
He showed no thirst for aggression.

14. But if he sleeps a moment from watching me
His family tastes the bitterness of deprivation.

15. Perhaps while frightening me, he is gentle,
If he were a poet like me, he might eulogize me,

16. Or maybe he returns to his children
And remembers my image and weeps for me.

17. And in the solid wall is a window
With thick bars giving meaning to life.

18. I have often looked out of it contemplating
Those awake in the face of sorrow.

19. So I see clouds, picturing
What bitterness is in people's hearts.

20. The same feeling for all even if they
Conceal it, and death is declared for me.

21. And a whisper goes round in my heart, what
Madness made me fall for rebellion?

22. Was it not better for me to appear
Like the masses, walking in submission?

23. What harm if I had stayed silent and whenever
Sorrow overcame me, I resorted to secrecy?

24. This is my blood which will flow extinguishing
The flames that rose in my sides.

25. And my concealed heart in its beats
Will tomorrow cease its throbbing.

26. And injustice remains, my death will not
Destroy its chains or be a sacrifice for it.

27. The caravan of tyranny will not be harmed
If one sheep is uprooted from the flock.

28. This is the discourse of the soul when it bares
My humanity and then passes after a few moments.

29. And it says to me that life has a purpose
Higher than applauding oppression.

30. Your heated breath, even if extinguished
Will keep fueling their horizons with smoke.

31. And the wounds on your body under their whips
Are streaks of dawn protected from the criminal.

32. The tear of the prisoner there in his shackles
And the blood of the martyr will meet here.

33. Until when the valleys are flooded with them
Nothing remains but the rebellion of the flood.

34. And of the storms, the blowing that comes
After calm and the relief of the captain.

35. Indeed, the burning fire in the earth’s core
Is something that provokes the volcano’s anger.

36. And the falling of drops followed after it
By a flood, then the gushing of the deluge.

37. It surges, uprooting the tyrants, roaring
Stronger than despotism and the sultanate.

38. I do not know if my story will be remembered
Or obscured by the darkness of oblivion?

39. Or will I be in our history
A conspirator or destroyer of idols?

40. All I know is that my drinking
The cup of humiliation is not up to me.

41. If I had not been demanding in my revolution
Nothing but enlightenment for my nation, it would have been enough for me.

42. I love life honorable, with no shackles,
No terror, no disdain for humankind.

43. So when I fall I will carry my honor
The blood of the free boiling in my veins.

44. My father, if the morning dawns on the world
And the light of the sun illuminates every place,

45. And the sparrow in his branches
Welcomes a new day, bright in color,

46. And you hear the melodies of optimism
Flowing from the mouth of the milkman,

47. And he comes knocking on our door as usual,
He will knock on the prison door, the torturers.

48. And after a moment I will be swinging,
Hanging from the rope tied to the gallows.

49. Let your solace be that this rope was not
Made by hands in these lands.

50. They wove it in a country which radiates civilization
And from it the torches of knowledge shine.

51. Or so they claimed! And it was brought
To my wounded country by agents.

52. I do not want you to live broken
In the crowd of pain and sorrow.

53. Your son shackled in his chains
Has been led to death without being condemned.

54. So remember the tales from my childhood days
Which you told me about the love of homelands.

55. And if you hear my mother crying in the darkness
Weeping for youth lost in its prime,

56. And she hides her regrets in her depths
A pain she conceals from the neighbors.

57. Ask her to forgive me, I want from her
Only absolution.

58. The echo of her talk is still in my hearing,
And her words of mercy and affection.

59. My son, I have become sickly,
No resilience left in me for sorrow.

60. So give joy to my heart by searching
For a lawful wife, and leave your disobedience.

61. She was a wish, a delight for me,
O goodness of hopes she had and wishes!

62. And now I do not know with what senses
She will spend the night after me, or with what madness.

63. This which I have penned for you, my father,
Is some of what runs through a weary mind.

64. But if light prevails and the masses’ hands
Tear up the pirates’ law,

65. Then those in my country who were allies of disgrace
Will remember me and magnify my resolve.

66. And until we meet in the shade of justice,
The sanctity of judgements and the scale,