1. Had it not been for shame, longing would have returned me,
And I would have visited your grave, where loved ones are visited.

2. And I did look, not indulging a single glance,
At the grave, where the digger's tool had penetrated.

3. So may your Lord reward you among your kin with a glance,
And give your tomb flowing, gushing water to drink.

4. My heart was confused when a great event overcame me,
And your little ones with amulets were still young.

5. I tend the stars though bright Canopus has set.
The stars' girdle as though they were thorn-trees.

6. What a fine companion you were, a dangling ornament,
A shelter for the affliction of stones.

7. You lived honored, and left,
Untouched by any baseness or poverty.

8. Your tomb drinks from a flashing smile,
A torrent, and a continuous spring.

9. A torrent, when it lodges in a country,
Is as though its valleys were rivers.

10. A mounted glow that illuminates as it flashes
Like lightning under the bellies of pregnant clouds.

11. You were honored among the clan, and there was no fear
Of the misfortunes of Umm Hazra, your neighbor.

12. And I saw you wrapped in the fairest raiment,
With beauty, tranquility, and dignity.

13. The wind blows sweet when you face it,
Your virtue unsullied, unstained.

14. And when I walked at night I saw your fire light up
A face the hue of saffron, made more beautiful thereby.

15. The angels who were chosen saluted you,
And the righteous and the pious,

16. And from your Lord descend upon you whenever
The pilgrims stand praying there in their robes.

17. O glance of mine, what day when tears
Poured down Umm Hazra's cheek at Numaira!

18. The ruins are restored by the spring rain,
Then wear away again from the showers.

19. As though she had dwellings amidst its singing brooks
And the quarter where the Jewish scholars lived.

20. Do not blame me too much if you see me blame you,
Lest your forbearance be quite used up.

21. They were a mixed bunch, and now they have become
Changers of abode and dwelling place.

22. It is not long before boon companions separate,
Night and day both decline upon them.

23. Umm Hazra, O Farazdaq, have you reviled her,
And the Almighty King is angered against you?

24. When her husband was absent she guarded discretion,
And secrets were hidden and honor conserved.

25. She is not like your mother, when a bastard
Tore her rag and she had no veil.

26. We will rouse your bastard but no bastard
Will be stirred up by the braying of a MODEL_MARYY_SI*.

27. The basket was found at his grave
And the two b**** gathered up and the pruning knife.

28. His tomb weeps when a male camel brays
Or a young pregnant camel splits its lip.

29. The mortar quaked and on its oriental side
A b*** howled and brands flew.

30. The sons of Fuqaym killed your father wrongfully
When he was dragged off without even a loincloth.

31. They hamstrung his she-camels, and in killing him
There was no killing, just hamstringing and harm.

32. Hadra' denied them the camels and their stench
And the free man prevents his wrong by denial.

33. When she saw the rust on his coat of mail,
The color all dark and the pattern fragmented,

34. Al-Farazdaq said, "Patch you our leather bags!"
She said, "And how can leather bags be patched?"

35. "Patch your gear! My grandfather was Khalid
While your grandsire was a bastard who did not beget you honorably."

36. And I heard her appeal to Duhl that they
Had wronged her in-law, the camels, and were aggressors.

37. She called down on the sculptor a potent curse,
Mingled with supplication and caution,

38. Beseeching your Lord that her companion
Not be a camel herded by the storm winds,

39. And charging La'ima, Ziyad's daughter, and her son,
That the noble are shamed by in-laws.

40. "Had it been slander, I could have borne it,
But with slander came estrangement and harm."

41. Why did you not prevent Zubayr that day the sun blazed?
A war whose brands the swords would ignite?

42. And Zubayr called but the camel litters did not stir,
Had you named them swine, they would have charged.

43. They duped Zubayr as though they were
Plough oxen with no herdsman to drive them.

44. You played false with the two silent men,
Ibn al-Aamm and Umm Bayba's rope a neighbor.

45. The party of Ibn al-Sadd shamed you
And your people's livers lost all bitterness.

46. Bilta passed the night perplexed, not knowing
What to do, no aid, and no young girls about.

47. They reviled the donkey but I will lampoon women,
Purity itself, in the midst of their tents.

48. Al-Farazdaq will not cease to importune Jarir
Until enmity departs from his breast.

49. Why argue, when I have outstripped, riding freely,
A desert stage that wearied all eyes?

50. The chiefs of Quraysh have judged in my favor, so confess,
O camel-master, you and the Allies.

51. Have I in two hundred lines, and two hundred,
Reached the utmost bounds and limit?

52. Al-Farazdaq lied! Mujashi's stick is crooked
And their crosspiece is rickety and unsound.

53. When you are distended, you son of Mujashi,
Are beneath contempt, a squandering disseminator.

54. Sa'd refused you the sanctuary of their protection
Or the shelter that protectors allow.

55. Long before that, Jarir, you tasted our character
Until you despaired, and the beak was blunted.

56. O bastard son of camels, and long have I tried you,
When the strings are plucked, the rending occurs.

57. Do not think, in addressing al-Farazdaq again,
That joy awaits Mujashi and good news him.

58. The poems have lopped off Mujashi,
Sewn together with poison and set on fire.

59. You have reached the end of your rope with undoing them,
And you are undone, beyond continuance.

60. Your people thought you a poet
Until you drowned, and the current swept you away.

61. Al-Farazdaq stripped away what pleased Mujashi,
With neither wager nor exchange left over.

62. Your hands fell short of the sky so there could be on earth
No rest for the wicked tree.

63. Nuwar praised al-Farazdaq, speaking calumny,
She spoke truly, Nuwar told no lie about you.

64. Al-Farazdaq remains forever masked
And the evil deed continues to point to him.

65. It cannot be hidden from you that Mujashi,
Had they been inflated from the ***s, would have flown!

66. They may be captured but no captive of theirs is ransomed,
And they are killed but the strings are unharmed,

67. And they waylay you when the bones are weak
And the brain flows, the giddiness of epilepsy.

68. They looked at you when their zeal was cooling,
As hyenas look when vertigo seizes them.

69. Al-Farazdaq was linked with the bastard and his mother,
While Abu'l-Farazdaq's veils were rent.

70. He began to blink like an old man with two bondsmen
And neighbors to quarrel with.

71. My people have no dealings in baskets,
Rather my people's trade is in spears.

72. My horsemen, their horses have necks bleeding
Where the foe has learned of passes to invade.

73. While Mujashi's horses have never sweated blood,
No sweat nor track from them.

74. We and your bastards patch their leather sacks,
Our secret, to seize dominion and advance.

75. Our fetters champed on the sons of Munzir
Until the tyrant acquiesced in our rule,

76. And we left perforce the sons of Hujayma
For the sons of Hujayma the spears are vile.

77. The chief of a kingdom bowed his brow,
Blood and dust clouding his eyebrows,

78. We defend our luck with our lives, glorying
In danger, and honor the perils.

79. And when the woman go forth with no veils,
We yearn, and when they go out we deny.

80. But Mujashi put Malik's horsemen to shame,
And the wild pigs slew them and routed them!

81. Clouds, had the garrison witnessed my horsemen,
They would not have shackled 'Athjal and Dirar!

82. O camel's son, how can you seek our glory
When you bear the camels' brand on your face?