Sol 6

  1. I lay awake for a lightning flash that visited me by night.

    As though it had left a painful sting in my eye,

  2. Or the heat of a peppercorn that had irritated it

    When its maker stripped away its skin and exposed its heat.

  3. When cares come to you in a fresh wave,

    If you do not give their arrival an outlet,

  4. They become an illness under which you sink,

    And wear you down with needs and recollections.

  5. So I came to be in prison, with guards watching me,

    After slipping stealthily through open country and towns,

  6. And riding a lean mount that crosses the night in flight,

    Swimming like a ship through a running, deep sea.

  7. O soul, do not despair: I have an appointed span,

    And every soul has its allotted day and measure.

  8. The reach of my hopes does not bring my day any nearer;

    My journeys and wanderings have taken me far, out of regard for you.

  9. I have an appointed end, if you understand:

    That is where my knowledge and my traces come to an end.

  10. You belong to God; if He protects you, hold fast to Him.

    And if you prove false, God suffices me as a protector.

  11. Call upon Him in secret and cry to Him openly:

    God knows what I declare and what I conceal.

  12. Happiness in this world does not belong to the one who merely hopes;

    The happy one is the one who escapes the Fire.

  13. May your prison and its inhabitant be watered

    By a steady rain pouring abundant water,

  14. By every dark cloud whose water is spread across the sky,

    Its rain outlets pouring, driven onward from Gemini.

  15. I have called out, sparing no effort to make him hear:

    Abu al-Walid, though the prison of Dawwar stands between us.

  16. I am inside a place with battlements, its exit shut

    By a teak door with a secure, creaking lock.

  17. I call to him as a wronged man calls, that he may help me;

    Then I sought help from a man of favors and high standing.

  18. I bring my grievance to the noble Ibrahim:

    I was driven from my home without a crime.

  19. All my days I drag a shackle and struggle with it,

    And a ring they have fastened with a nail.

  20. I move about in it by day; then my place of return

    At night is dark, fastened with buttons.

  21. It seems to lie between two strips they cut,

    Like the back of a gray beast coated with pitch.

  22. O you nearest of all people to praise and honor,

    And farthest of all people from blame and shame,

  23. Most forgiving of all when you have the power to punish,

    And a forest lion fierce against his enemies,

  24. A tawny lion whose charge kills his opponent,

    As he clasps him between fangs and claws:

  25. Grant me a generous favor from you,

    From the bounty of a noble man who can help or harm.

  26. You are the most faithful in al-Yamama to one who seeks your protection;

    Your hands grasp a cord that does not give way.

Sol 6