طرفان طرف مساعد — Abdul Mohsen Al Suri — Saqi

Two eyes: the eye of an idle helper,
and the eye of one who strives;
both keep sleepless vigil, though their sleeplessness
is not for one and the same cause.
Who would compare an ailing man
with his attendant or a visitor?
I love the world, patiently enduring
its ever-deepening estrangement.
I go forth with a suitor’s ardor for it,
yet in the state of an ascetic,
struggling for my livelihood amid
calamities and hardships.
Why, then, should I disown my habit,
when all people are creatures of habit?
As though I did not know
that Time itself opposes me!
When I saw that my rewards
from its people, and all my gains,
were merely description repaid with description,
and praises answered with praises;
and heard the very man I sought
address me in the language of a seeker,
I cried: Is there one counterfeit dirham
to be had for ten poems?
A state, by your life, that cannot please you,
O son of ʿAbd al-Wāḥid—
neither in one who acknowledges what
you bestow, nor in one who denies it.
So be angry: nothing will satisfy me for it
but the wrath of a noble man
who strives as you strive in the race
toward the farthest goal;
who rises, while high glory soars
far above the posture of one seated;
who presents himself for praise, well
known through the truthfulness of his praise-singer.
It is as though the whole world upon him
came crowding, envoy after envoy.
How many a man departing from his bounty
strengthened the resolve of one arriving!
O you through whom I faced calamities
with my sleeve rolled back from my forearm,
and fended off from them all that I could,
turning their course away from my envier—
go gently with your bounty: you have secured
it against every rival in generosity.
You alone remain; there is no escape
from your largesse for anyone who turns aside.
Time looked upon you, apart
from all mankind, with a critic’s gaze.
So glory in it: you have indeed wrested
something sound from one corrupt.