مسهد القلب في خديه أدمعه

قد طالما شرقت بالوجد أضلعه

Sleepless at heart, with his tears upon his cheeks.

His ribs have long choked with longing.

داني الهموم بعيد الدار نازحها

رجع الأنين سكيب الدمع مفزعه

Close to sorrows, far from home, displaced from it.

Echoing groans and streaming tears are his refuge.

يأوي إلى زفرات لو يباشرها

قاسي الحديد فواقاً ذات أجمعه

He takes refuge in sighs which, if touched by

hard iron for an instant, [would melt] it wholly.

إذا تخلل في أرجائها فرحا

ظللت قواصفها باليأس تقرعه

If he passes joyfully through their reaches,

their tempests overshadow him, pounding him with despair.

وإن ونت لوعة عن كنه صولتها

هبت له لوعة رقشاء تلسعه

And if one pang slackens from the full force of its assault,

a mottled pang rises against him and stings him.

تاهت به في بحار الحزن فكرته

حتى رمته سحيقاً ضل مرجعه

His thought led him astray through seas of sorrow,

until it hurled him far away, his way back lost.

كم فكرة داهمته في مسارحها

تسقيه سماً نقيعاً بات يجرعه

How many a thought has overtaken him in its roaming grounds,

making him drink potent poison he swallows through the night.

ذكرى أفيراخه في كل ناحية

توحي إلى القلب أسراراً تقطعه

The memory of his little fledglings, on every side,

whispers secrets to the heart that tear it apart.

كم قد تحمل من أعباء نأيهم

نضوا نبا بلذيذ النوم مضجعه

How many burdens of their remoteness he has borne,

wasted away, his bed denying him sweet sleep.

قد عاند الحزن حتى عاد يرحمه

وساور الدمع حتى جف مدمعه

He has defied sorrow until it came to pity him,

and wrestled with tears until his tear duct ran dry.

وصار يرحمه من كان يعذله

لما اصطفاه من الأعواز أشنعه

And those who once reproached him now pity him,

when the harshest of privations singled him out.

تجول حلته في ذاته فترى

آثار ما الدهر بالأحرار يصنعه

His robe moves about his body, and you see

the traces of what time does to noble men.

جسم تخونت الأيام جثته

فعاد كالشن مرآه ومسمعه

A body whose frame the days have ravaged,

now like a worn-out waterskin in both sight and sound.

تناهبت نوب الدنيا محاسنه

فالضيم ملبسه والسجن موضعه

The world's calamities have plundered his beauty,

so humiliation is his garment and prison his abode.

يشكو إلى القيد ما يلقاه من ألم

فبالأنين لدى شكواه يرجعه

He complains to his fetters of the pain he suffers,

and at his complaint they echo back a groan.

يا هاجعا والرزايا لا تؤرقه

قل كيف نهجع من في الكبل مهجعه

O sleeper whom calamities do not keep awake,

tell me: how can we sleep—we whose bed is in shackles?

أم كيف حاله حي ساكن حدثا

يرنو بعين أسير عز مطمعه

Or how fares a living man dwelling in [a grave],

gazing with a captive's eye, his hope so hard to attain?

قد طال في هاويات السجن محبسه

وانشت من شغله ما كان يجمعه

His confinement in prison's abysses has lasted long,

and what he used to gather through his work has become scattered.

فكم زنر بقد الصخر أيسره

وكم أنين بنار الوجد يشفعه

How often he has girded his left side with a strap of rock,

and how many a groan he joins with the fire of longing!

ما رجعت سجعها حينا مطوقة

إلا ومن فضل شحوي ما ترجعه

Never has a collared dove echoed her cooing, even once,

but her echo comes from the overflow of my sorrow.

ولا تجزع كاس الوجد من أحد

إلا ومن فضل وجدي ما تجرعه

And no cup of longing [is drunk] by anyone,

but what you swallow comes from the overflow of my longing.

يا راحلا عند حي عنده رمقي

أقر السلام على من لم أودعه

O traveler to the clan where my last breath remains,

convey peace to the one to whom I gave no farewell.

وسله بالله عن عهدي الحفظه

فعهده بمكان لا اضيعه

And ask him, by God, about my pledge: has he kept it?

For his pledge is kept where I will not let it be lost.

وكيف عني وعن أنسي تصبره

أم كيف بعد بعادي عنه أربعه

And how does he endure being without me and my companionship?

Or how fare his dwellings after my departure from him?

تجهمت نوب الدنيا لعامرها

فلا يد عن يد الضرار تمنعه

The world's calamities have scowled upon its inhabitant,

so no hand protects him from the hand of harm.

واطول شوقاه ما جد البعاد بهم

اليهم مذ سعوا للبين أفظعه

Oh, how long my yearning, as separation presses on with them—

for them, ever since they set out for the most dreadful parting!

لئن تباعد جثماني فلم أرهم

فعندها وأبيك القلب أجمعه

Even if my body is far away and I have not seen them,

yet there, by your father, is my entire heart.

أقول والدهر قد غالت غوائله

وحظ مني مكاناً كان يرفعه

I say, as time's calamities have ravaged me,

and [lowered] a station of mine it once exalted:

عسى لطائف من لا شيء يعجزه

تحنو على شملنا يوماً فتجمعه

May the gentle favors of Him whom nothing can thwart

bend kindly toward our company one day and reunite it—

بمبتني المجد مذ خلت تمائمه

بحيث لا نوب الدنيا تضعضعه

through the builder of glory, ever since his amulets fell away,

where the world's calamities cannot shake him,

بحيث يشتجر الخطي في صفد

ويفطم السيف ذا باس ويرضعه

where Khattian spears intertwine amid fetters,

and the sword weans a man of valor and suckles him.

بالحاجب المرتجى السامي أرومنه

إلى هلال الذي بالمعد مطلعه

Through the hoped-for chamberlain, whose [lineage] rises

to Hilal, whose rising is in Maʿadd [reading uncertain].

سما إلى غاية في المجد ساميه

قتال غاية ما قد كان يرميه

He rose to a lofty height in glory,

[attaining] the utmost he had been aiming for.

فأصبحت قلل السامين خاضعة

لعزه وسماء المجد موضعه

So the summits of the lofty became submissive

to his might, and the sky of glory is his abode.

وارتاح للعرف والحاجات يسألها

فغص بالوفد والآمال مصنعه

And he delights in kindness and inquires about needs,

so his palace teems with delegations and hopes.

نعم الشفيع لمن ضاقت مذاهبه

لدى الخليفة أسمى من يشفعه

What a fine intercessor for one whose paths have narrowed,

before the caliph—the loftiest whose intercession he accepts!

وكل زارع خير عند مضطهد

فسوف يحصد ما قد كان يزرعه

And everyone who sows goodness for an oppressed man

will reap what he has sown.

فعش عزيزاً على الأيام محتكماً

ما هز ذيل الصبا غصناً يزعزعه

So live in honor, sovereign over the days,

as long as the east wind's hem shakes a bough and sways it.