كجسمك جسمي أصبح اليوم بالياً — Ibn Sanaa Almalk

كجسمكَ جسمي أَصبح اليوم بالياً

ولكنَّ ما بِي عاد للنَّاسِ بَاديَا

Like your body, mine has grown wasted today,

but what ails me has become plain to everyone.

يخيَّل لي أَنِّي دُعيتُ إِلى الرّدى

وأَنَّك عنِّي قد أَجَبْتَ المُنادِيَا

It seems to me that I was summoned to death,

and that you answered the caller in my stead.

أَردتَ فِدائي من نِدايَ ولو تَرى

حقيقةَ حالي خِلْتَنِي لَكَ فَادِيَا

You wished to ransom me from my summons; yet, could you see

my true condition, you would think I had ransomed you.

فيا أَسفِي إِذ كنتَ قبليَ ماضِيَا

ويا خَجَلِي إِذ صرتُ بعدَكَ بَاقِيا

Ah, my sorrow that you went before me,

and my shame that I remained after you!

أَقلُّ اكتئابِي أَن أَرَى القلبَ جَازِعاً

وأَيسرُ وَجْدي أَن أَرى الطَرْفَ بَاكيا

The least of my grief is to see my heart distraught,

the lightest of my anguish, to see my eye weeping.

ولسْت براضٍ أَن أَرى الطرفَ دامِعاً

إِلى أَن أَراهُ من دمِ القلبِ دامِيَا

I am not content to see my eye shed tears

until I see it bleeding with my heart's blood.

لصيرتَ قلبي من حُلَى الصبرِ عارياً

وصيرتَ خدِّي من حُلَى الدَّمعِ كَاسِيَا

You have indeed stripped my heart of patience's ornaments

and clothed my cheek in the ornaments of tears.

وغَاضَ فؤادي في بِحارِ همومِهِ

فأَلْقَى إِلى جَفْني الدَّموعَ لآلِيَا

My heart sank into the seas of its cares

and cast tears up to my eyelid as pearls.

كأَنَّ جُفوني إِذ تكاثَرَ دَمعُها

تَعُدُّ على الدنيا بِهِنَّ المساويا

As though my eyelids, when their tears grew many,

were tallying the world's wrongs against it with those tears.

وإِني لأَنْهِي الجفْنَ عن فيضِ دمعِه

لأَنِّي رأَيتُ الدَّمع للهمِّ مَاحِيَا

Indeed, I forbid my eyelid to pour forth its tears,

because I have seen tears wipe sorrow away.

يقولون قد أَسرفْتَ في الحُزْنِ بعده

فقلت عسَى أَلقاهُ في الحَشْرِ رَاضِيَا

They say, "You have gone too far in mourning him."

I said, "May I meet him at the Resurrection pleased with me."

لأُغْضِبَه إِنِّي وقد كَانَ ناظِري

غَدَوْتُ عليه من ثَرَى القبرِ جَاثِيا

Surely I anger him: I—though he was the pupil of my eye—

have come to heap upon him the earth of the grave.

وقد كان لو مرَّ التُّرابُ برجلِه

لكنت بكفِّي بل بعَيْنيَ وَاقِيَا

Yet, had dust so much as passed by his foot,

I would have shielded it with my palm—no, with my eye.

عليَّ يمينٌ للحِفاظِ وقد نَأَى

خليلُ الهَوى أَن لا أَرَى الصَبْر دَانِيَا

An oath of loyalty binds me, now that he has gone far away—

love's companion—never to let patience come near.

وللدَّهرِ من بَعْد ابن غازٍ أَليَّةٌ

بأَن لاَ يزالَ السقْمُ للجسْم غازِيَا

After Ibn Ghaz, Time too has sworn an oath

that sickness shall never cease invading the body,

وأَنَّ لِواءَ القلبِ أَصبحَ خَافِقاً

على مَفْرَقِ الهمِّ الذي جَاءَ وَالِيا

and that the heart's banner has begun to flutter

above the head of sorrow, which has come as ruler.

وجدتُ الليالي صِرْن فيه عَوَالِياً

تَطاعِنُني والنائباتُ مَواضِيَا

I found the nights had turned, on his account, into spearheads

that thrust at me, and calamities into keen blades.

وسَوف تراني عن قسيِّ أَضَالِعِي

بقَلْبي إِذْ أَعيانيَ الصبرُ راميا

Soon you will see me, from the bows of my ribs,

shooting my heart, since patience has proved beyond me.

وقفتُ أُنادي الصبرَ في مَعْركِ الأَسَى

فلم أَلْقَ فيه من يُجِيبُ المُنَادِيا

I stood calling for patience on sorrow's battlefield,

but found no one there to answer the caller.

كأَنَّي على جَمْر الغَضَا كُنْتُ واقِفاً

وإِلا على جَمْرِ الحشَا كُنْت وَاطِيَا

As though I stood upon ghada-wood embers,

or else were treading the embers of my breast.

إِذا كانَ داءُ الجسم والقلبِ موتَه

فيا بُعْدَ دائِي بعدَه من دَوَائِيا

If his death is the sickness of my body and heart,

how far, after him, my sickness is from my cure!

لقد كان عضباً أَرهَف العَزْمُ حدَّه

وأَعيا يميني أَن تَسُلَّ المواضِيا

He was a sharp sword whose edge resolve had honed,

and left my right hand unable to unsheathe keen blades.

وقد كنت منه حين أَصبَح في يَدِي

أَسُرُّ المُوَالي أَو أَضرُّ المُواريا

With him, when he had come into my hand, I would

delight an ally or harm a dissembler.

وقد كان إِحسانُ الليالي وحسنُها

فقُومُوا بنا حتَّى نُعزِّي اللياليا

He was the kindness and the beauty of the nights;

so rise, and let us go to console the nights.

أَعدُّ الليالي ليلةً بعد ليلةٍ

وقد عِشْتُ دَهراً لا أَعدُّ اللياليا

I count the nights, one night after another,

though I lived an age without counting nights.

خَلِيلي قد آنَسْتُ عندك جفوةً

وما جاءَ في الأَخبارِ كونُك جَافِيا

My friend, I have sensed coldness in you,

yet no report has ever told of you being cold.

أَتُعرضُ عنِّي والغرامُ كما بدا

وتَصْدِفُ عنِّي والدموعُ كما هيا

Do you turn away from me, while love is as it first began,

and shun me, while the tears remain as they were?

وبي غُلَّةٌ لولاك لم أَذْكِ جَمرَها

ولم يَغدُ منها الماءُ بالْجَمْرِ صَالِيَا

Within me burns a thirst whose embers, but for you, I would not have stoked,

nor would water, through it, have come to roast upon the coals.

إِذا ما همومي خالطَ الماءُ مَتْنها

تكدَّر لوناً بعد ما كانَ صَافييا

Whenever water mingles with the surface of my cares,

its color clouds, after having been clear.

ومن غُلَّتي قد درَّعَ الماءُ نَفْسَهُ

من الخَوْفِ منها أَن أَتاها مُلاَقِيا

Water has armored itself against my burning thirst,

out of fear of it, since it had come to confront it.

فلا تحسبنَّ العيشَ بعدك ناعماً

ولا تحسبنَّ الحالَ بَعْدك حَالِيَا

So do not think life after you is pleasant,

nor think my condition after you is sweet.

وكلُّ سُرورٍ صار بَعْدَك تَرْحَةً

وكلُّ بشيرٍ صَارَ عنديِ نَاعِيَا

Every joy has turned to sorrow after you,

and every bringer of good news has become to me a herald of death.

أَرى كلَّ وقت لم تكن فيه عاطِلاً

وكلَّ مَكان لم تكنْ فِيه خَالِيَا

I see every moment without you as unadorned,

and every place where you are not as empty.

رفعتُ لسلطانِ الفراقِ ظُلاَمةً

فوقَّع عنه اليأْسُ أَن لا تلاقيا

I raised a grievance to the sovereign of separation,

and Despair signed in his name: "No reunion."

أَودُّ الليالي أَن تطولَ لأَنَّني

عَليْكَ حداداً قد لَبِسْتُ اللياليا

I wish the nights would lengthen, for I

have put on the nights as mourning clothes for you.

وأَشكو إِلى الأَفلاكِ جَوْرَ نُجُومِها

فيضحكْنَ عن ثَغرِ الصباح هَوازِيا

I complain to the spheres of their stars' injustice,

but they laugh mockingly, revealing the mouth of dawn.

وقال أُناسٌ للدراري درايةٌ

فيا ليتني دَارَيتُ عنك الدَرَارِيَا

Some people have said the radiant stars possess knowledge;

if only I had placated those radiant stars for you!

ولو قَبِلَتْ فيك الكواكُب فِدْيةً

بَذَلْتُ لها رُوحي وأَهْلي ومَالِيا

Had the stars accepted a ransom for you,

I would have offered them my soul, my kin, and my wealth.

فيا عقرَب الأَفلاكِ لا زلت لادغاً

ويا أَسَدَ الأَبراجِ ما زلتَ ضَارِياً

O Scorpion of the spheres, may you never cease to sting,

and O Lion of the zodiac, you have never ceased to ravage.

لقد ضلَّ بل قد ذَلَّ من ظنَّ أَنَّهُ

يُقَوِّمُ بالعَتْبِ النجومَ السَّوارِيا

Truly astray—indeed, abased—is anyone who thinks

he can straighten the night-roaming stars with reproach.

أَكادُ أَعدُّ الشَّهبَ والتُّربَ والحصَى

ولا أَدَّعي أَنِّي أَعُدُّ المَرَارِيا

I could almost count the shooting stars, the dust, and the pebbles,

but I do not claim I can count the bitter woes.

وحسبُكَ أَنِّي والتغزُّلَ مَذْهَبي

غدا بي قريضي لا يُدَانِي المَراثِيا

Suffice it that, though love poetry is my way,

my verse has become far removed from elegies.

عليَّ ولي في الدَّهرِ همٌّ وفرحةٌ

فيا ليت أَنِّ لا عليَّ ولا لِيَا

Time holds sorrow against me and joy in my favor;

if only it held nothing against me and nothing for me!