1. We belong to God; no living being endures.

    The ultimate fate of all but God is extinction.

  2. We return to God; he who dies

    and he who lives a thousand years are alike.

  3. A man rejoices in the morning, not knowing

    what nightfall conceals.

  4. The world's enjoyment is little; whatever

    worldly debris a man delights in is dust.

  5. A calamity has made people indifferent to life;

    the news terrified us with its horror.

  6. Palace of Helwan, you were the fairest palace,

    where the air is sweet and pleasant.

  7. You possessed a majesty feared

    by Time, before which adversity stumbled.

  8. How have you been brought low, with calamity

    climbing to your impregnable bastion?

  9. We never knew your glory thus: assailed

    by the nights, or overtaken by an ending.

  10. Yesterday, within your shelter dwelt Abu al-Abbas;

    the living drew life from his cheerful countenance.

  11. Then calamities folded up his mantle, though

    before they suffered and grieved at his good fortune.

  12. Alas for those who followed his bier! Into the grave they laid

    a noble man for whom greatness weeps.

  13. And they were content with weeping; yet grief is nothing but

    the flowing of hearts and entrails.

  14. He lived among us, sweet in cheerfulness and character;

    through him, thirsty souls were quenched.

  15. He departed, leaving in our breasts a longing

    for him that no water can quench.

  16. Egypt was bereft of his radiance, just as

    a beautiful woman is bereft of her jewels.

  17. Every calamity beside yours, O Egypt,

    offers people some hope of consolation.

  18. What can the elegists say of Tawfiq's loss,

    and what can the poets attempt?

  19. Some calamities give speech

    free rein; others leave the eloquent helpless.

  20. Indeed, your lord was the fairest of those

    whose radiant faces make the broad plain proud.

  21. The crown upon his head bore a light

    beside which all other lights seemed paltry.

  22. He dispelled the darkness of calamities, when they grew grave,

    with judgment to which all other judgments bowed.

  23. He knew best among mankind how to earn praise;

    ah, if only praise could make souls immortal!

  24. Noble house of Tawfiq, put on patience

    as a robe—what a fine robe patience is.

  25. You are firmly grounded in knowledge of what has been;

    then say: whom has death spared?

  26. Where are the people who built the lands and ruled

    them, while eminence held them dear?

  27. They possessed the earth for an age, then became

    lodgers within its depths.

  28. Every soul has a book and an appointed time;

    when it comes, no decree can be turned back.

  29. This is God's law among His creatures: never have

    kings or prophets been exempted from it.

  30. I offer you no consolation; how could words like mine

    bring consolation to the wise?

  31. Praise God in the evening and at

    daybreak, for misery has been followed by happiness.

  32. If a full moon has fallen from your sky,

    then your Abbas gives light.

  33. Abbas has shown us, after his father,

    how the great confront great ordeals.

  34. He inherited kingship from his father; and when

    he took charge, hope stirred within us.

  35. We beheld him—a mountain of glory and a wall

    whose structure encircled the land.

  36. How fine his resolve, which makes the difficult

    docile, and his unyielding might!

  37. And steadfastness enfolding leaps

    toward exalted aims, and wisdom and proud defiance.

  38. And qualities whose essence defies

    description, and exhausts all enumeration.

  39. May he ever clothe time in beauty and bestow

    blessings that no ending can taint.

Sol 6.1