من لي بظبي كحيل الطرف ساجيه

وذي وشاح نحيل الخصر واهيه

Who will bring me a gazelle, kohl-dark and tranquil of eye,

and one wearing a sash, slender and delicate of waist?

حلو الشمائل ممشوق القواء إذا

مرت عليه نسيم الريح تثنيه

Sweet in manner, gracefully slender in build—when

a breath of wind passes over him, it bends him.

نفاثة السحر للعشاق أعينه

عن بابل سحرها النفاث ترويه

His eyes breathe magic upon lovers;

they transmit from Babylon its spell-breathing magic.

حرام قتلى بشرع الحب حلله

غداة في جفنه أفتاه قاضيه

My slaying, forbidden under love's law, he made lawful

that morning its judge gave him a ruling within his eyelid.

علام يا قوس جفنيه بلا ترةٍ

قلب المشوق بسهم الغنج تصميه

Why, O bow of his eyelids, without a grievance,

do you slay the yearning heart with coquetry's arrow?

موكلاً في عداد الشهب ناظره

حتى على الغمض أعياه تلاقيه

Leaving his gaze charged with counting the stars,

until even bringing his eyelids together for sleep defeats him.

غاليت من مدمعي سوماً وحين أتى

يوم الفراق به أرخصت غاليه

You bid high for my tears; and when

the day of parting brought them, you cheapened their precious worth.

فساقطت مقلتي دراً تقلده

عند الوداع عقيقاً في تراقيه

So my eye rained pearls to necklace him

at farewell, as carnelian upon his collarbones.

يا مروي الخد من ماء الشباب أما

ترق للوامق الادي فترويه

O you whose cheek is watered with youth's fresh water, will you not

pity the parched lover and give him drink?

ويا جني اللما دبت لتلسبني

عقارب الصدغ لما رحت أجنيه

And O ripe fruit of dusky lips! There crept, to sting me,

the scorpions of your temple-locks when I went to pluck it.

ورد الشقيق بروض الخد منك زها

كما بثغرك قد راقت أقاحيه

The anemone's bloom flourishes in your cheek's garden,

just as its daisies have grown lovely in your mouth.

والنرجس الغض من عينيك ما برحت

أفعى الغدائر عن عينيك تحميه

And the tender narcissus of your eyes is still

guarded there by the serpent of your tresses.

لا أستطيع خفاء الوجد من كلفي

وكيف يخفى وقاني الدمع بيديه

In my infatuation I cannot conceal my passion;

how could it hide, with crimson tears in its hands?

ينم دمعي على سري فيظهره

حسب الرقيب فإن الدمع واشيه

My tears betray my secret and reveal it;

enough for the watcher—tears are his informer.

من لي بطيف خيال منك يطرقني

وهناً فقلبي طروق الطيف يكفيه

Who will bring me a phantom image of you to visit me

late at night? A phantom's visit would suffice my heart.

أنى يلم خيال في خلال ضنىً

لا يألف الغمض والأشجان تبريه

How can a phantom come amid such wasting,

to one who knows no sleep, whom sorrows wear away?

من لي بمن يتلافى الصب من تلف

داء الصبابة يعي من تلافيه

Who will bring me someone to rescue the lover from destruction?

Love's sickness exhausts whoever tries to remedy it.

ما بال جنبي جفا بالليل مضجعه

أجل فإن غرير الطرف جافيه

Why has my side forsaken its bed at night?

Indeed, the innocent-eyed one shuns my side.

يصد عني فقل بالخشف منذعراً

فناظري أين ما ألوى يراعيه

He turns away from me: call him a startled fawn,

for my gaze watches him wherever he turns.

كم غض من طرفه مهما يمر به

خوفاً عليه من الألحا تدميه

How often my eye lowers its gaze as he passes by,

fearing for him the glances that might make him bleed.

أحوى المراشف ما أبقى تفننه

معنىً من الحسن إلا وهو يحويه

Dusky-lipped, his manifold charms leave

no quality of beauty that he does not possess:

في عين ظبي كنصل السيف جارحة

وواو صدغ كجنج الليل داجيه

in a gazelle's eye that wounds like a sword's blade,

and a wāw-shaped temple-curl, dark as the depths of night,

ومبسم مثل ومض البرق ساطعه

عليه تيهاً لئام الحسن يرخيه

and a smiling mouth, shining like lightning's flash,

over which, in pride, he lets beauty's veil fall.

لك الجفون إذا ما الغنج كحلها

تميت صبك أحياناً وتحييه

Yours are the eyelids that, when coquetry kohls them,

kill your lover at times and bring him back to life.

صحيح لحظك معتل الجفون بدا

يضارع السيف حدّاً فعل ماضيه

Your healthy gaze, with ailing eyelids, seems

to rival the sword in sharpness and the work of its keen blade.

تمارض ما بذاك اللحظ أم مرض

كلا الفتورين من شوقي أعانيه

Is what is in that gaze feigned sickness, or true disease?

I suffer both kinds of languor in my longing.

إن قلت ذا مرض فيه يكذبني

أني أراك غداة ألفتك صاحيه

If I say that sickness is in it, I am contradicted

by seeing you clear-eyed the morning I meet you.

أو قلت تمرضه عمداً عليه فلم

منه السقام لجسم الصب تهديه

Or, if I say you deliberately make it seem sick, then why

do you bestow illness from it upon your lover's body?

يا لائم العاشق العاني به سفها

وراك عنه فان اللوم يغريه

O you who foolishly blame the lover held captive by him,

leave him alone: reproach only spurs him on.

فزد أو انقص كلا الحالين مستمع

منك الملام إذا ما كنت تطريه

Increase or lessen it: in either case he hears

your reproach as though you were praising him.

يجلو حيمّاً إذا ما البدر قابله

أوفى عليه سناه في تجليه

He unveils a face that, when the full moon faces it,

outshines the moon with its radiance as it is unveiled.

وزف في ريقه صهباء أبدلها

عن الحباب جماناً في لئاليه

And in his saliva he escorts a tawny wine as a bride, replacing

its bubbles with pearl-beads among his pearls.

قاسي الفؤاد رقيق الخد منه غدا

قلب المشوق يقاسي ما يقاسيه

Hard of heart, tender of cheek—because of him, now

the yearning heart suffers all that it suffers.

قم عاطني الريق لا تمزج سلافته

فالريق أشهى من الصبا تعاطيه

Rise, pass me your saliva; do not dilute its pure wine:

for exchanging saliva is sweeter than youth.

فالكأس يحلو إذا كانت مدامته

ممزوجة باللما في ريق ساقيه

The cup tastes sweet when its wine is

mingled with dusky lips in its cupbearer's saliva.

يا ما أحيلي زمان اللهو حيث به

برد الشبيبة قد رقت حواشيه

Ah, how sweet the days of pleasure, when in them

youth's mantle had grown soft along its hems.

كأنما الفجر أعطا تبلجه

بعرس كاظم فابيضت لياليه

As though dawn bestowed its radiance

on Kazim's wedding, so its nights turned white.

فرع نما أصله بالفضل حين غدا

موسى بن جعفر للعلياء ينميه

A branch whose root flourished in virtue, when

Musa ibn Ja'far began raising it toward the heights.

عم البرية إحساناص ببذل يد

تولي الجميل لقاصيه ودانيه

He encompassed creation with kindness through a giving hand

that bestows goodness upon those far from him and near.

سمع كأن علي القدر مرنه

على المكارم فاعتادت أياديه

Generous, as though one exalted in rank had trained him

in noble deeds, until his hands made them their habit.

ذو همة نال فيها الحمد لو قرنت

يوماً بيذبل لا ندكت أعاليه

His aspiration wins him praise; if it were joined

one day to Yadhbul, its summits would crumble.

في مفرق الليل أما شب نار قرى

شابت بلمع السنا منه نواصيه

At night's hair-parting, whenever he kindles a fire for guests,

its forelocks grow gray with the gleam of his radiance.

إن ضل ركب الرجا يوماً بمجهله

إلى حماه لسان النار يهديه

If hope's caravan one day loses its way in a trackless waste,

the fire's tongue guides it to his sanctuary.

إن الجبال الروسي وهي شامخةٌ

تعلو فخاراً إذا عدت أثافيه

The firmly rooted mountains, though lofty,

rise in pride when counted as his hearthstones.

شاكي الزمان إذا ما حل ندوته

ببذله من علياء الداء يشفيه

When one complaining of the times enters his assembly,

his bounty heals him of affliction at its height.

إن يبتدي صدر نادي المجد هيكله

أضاء منه بنور العلم ناديه

When his figure appears at the head of glory's assembly,

his gathering shines with the light of his learning.

عبء الأمانة لم يوهنه مثقله

فخف فيه وبعض الناس يعييه

The burden of trust—its heavy weight has not weakened him;

it rests light upon him, though it exhausts other men.

يا من به أبل الآمال قد نشرت

قوادماً لأديم البيد تعاويه

O you through whom the camels of hope have spread

flight-feathers over the desert's skin, crying out to him.

هذا ابن جعفرٍ في حالي وغىً وندىً

غوثاً وغيثاً للاحيه وراجيه

This is Ibn Ja'far, in the two states of war and bounty,

succor and rain to his detractor and the one who hopes in him.

مشيداً للهدى والعلم بيت علا

أبوه من قبل بالأحكام بانيه

Raising for guidance and knowledge a house of eminence,

which his father had already built solidly before him.

فرد بجمع المساعي الغر متصف

ما في الأنام له ند يدانيه

Unique, endowed with every radiant achievement,

among all mankind he has no rival who comes near him.

وواحد عقمت أم الفخار فما

في الدهر قد انتجت يوماً بثانيه

And one alone: glory's mother has become barren, so

in all time she has never brought forth his equal.

وذو يراع أما السكر قامته

لما انثني بمدام الحبر يسقيه

He has a reed-pen whose shaft drunkenness has bent;

when it bends, he gives it the wine of ink to drink.

أصم إن تدعه يوماً لنازلةٍ

أجاب قبل الصدى بالنصر داعيه

Deaf, yet if you call upon it one day in calamity,

it answers its caller with victory before the echo comes.

يجني لآمله شهداً وحاسده

سماً جنى ومنايا في مجاريه

It gathers honey for the one who hopes in him; his envier

gathers poison and death along its channels.

رضيع در لبان العلم فلا ناشئه

عن المعارف لم يفطمه منشيه

Nursed on learning's flowing milk from his earliest youth,

his nurturer never weaned him from knowledge.

باريه للقدر الجاري فلا عجب

إن قلت في شأنه سبحان باريه

Its shaper serves destiny's course—no wonder

if I say of it, 'Glory to its Maker!'

خذها أبا أحمد غراء قلدها

جمان مدحك في أبهى لئاليه

Take it, Abu Ahmad, a radiant ode, adorned

with your praise's beads, its most splendid pearls.

فاسلم مدى الدهر ممدود الرواق علا

يلقى به الوفد نجماً في أمانيه

May you remain safe through all time, your canopy of glory spread wide,

where visiting delegations find the star of their hopes.