1. To whom do the abodes belong that I have covered in the evening,
With its two darknesses, so the plateau with legs became desolate?

2. The voice of the watchman yelled, so the beautiful one raised her voice.
The sheep walk in it slowly at night.

3. It is a house for Hind and Rabab, and so it seemed to me,
And Lamees, before the events of time.

4. I cried over the abodes as Ibn Khidham cried,
Bending over the ruined abodes.

5. Or don’t you see their young oryxes in the morning
Like palm trees among the thorns when picked?

6. Houries whose skins are scented with ambergris,
Fair of face, tender of body.

7. So I lingered in the ruins of the abode as if I were
Nashwan, spending the early morning drinking wine.

8. A nose the color of gazelle’s blood, drunk
From the wine of Anah or the vineyards of Shabam.

9. Its drinker’s tongue was as if laden with poison
That spread through his body, bringing sickness.

10. Adorned, which I looked at closely, and it frowned
Like the frowning of the ostrich in heated sands.

11. It marched against me so I said, “Restrain yourself,
For killing me is forbidden to you.”

12. So you were rewarded, the best reward for a single she-camel,
And you returned safe and sound, in peace.

13. As if it were Badr, the foal of Katifa,
Or as if from a rational chief, judges.

14. Convey to Subay’ if a message presents itself:
“I am your protector if you reside in front of me.”

15. Cut short your threats to me, for I am
Not too timid for what I may face.

16. I am the awakened one, after they were put to sleep,
And I am the one who proclaimed the dawn to the sleepy ones.

17. I am the one whose excellence Mudar knew,
And I sang of the nobility of Ibn Umm Qatam.

18. And I fight the hated hero with his own fight.
When I battle, my arrows do not miss.

19. My uncle the son of Kabsha, you knew his place,
And Abu Yazeed and his brothers, my paternal uncles.

20. And if you are harmed in a city and take leave of it,
I will not stay anywhere but my house.