Sol 5.6

  1. Your station on the nation’s horizon shines bright,

    and your renown among the people is celebrated.

  2. Your fame has traveled throughout the world, leaving not a single veil

    to hide it; every grateful soul offers praise of it.

  3. You have attained high rank in the abode of felicity,

    a valiant man who governs fortune’s blessings.

  4. You shoulder the people’s burdens with high resolve,

    and a determination by which calamity’s heart lies broken.

  5. If favor is sought from anyone other than you,

    I tell his companions, “Leave him and move on.”

  6. Ah, son of Nasrallah, praise is truly your due;

    you are noble, a champion of the noble.

  7. From the glorious Arabs, noble deeds live on in you,

    and among all people, you are their prince.

  8. Yours is the loftiest chivalrous pride; yours are generosity and fidelity.

    Yours is radiant discernment, and it sheds light.

  9. Qualities pure as water from the spring of purity—

    their fragrance wafts through the gardens of existence.

  10. The lands of Syria boast of you, because

    your splendid, luminous advent is dear to them.

  11. Will there come for them a blessed day when they see

    your radiance lighting their lofty towers?

  12. At the sight of you, hearts attain their joy,

    and you—by my life—are joy itself to joy.

  13. I am nothing but a love-struck wanderer, seeking the night journey,

    in hope—yet time is faithless.

  14. The world keeps delaying fulfillment of its promise to me,

    and hopes distract me as they wheel about.

  15. Glory tells me, pointing:

    “Toward you a full moon of glory beckons to a meeting.”

  16. Against my will, O Khalil, I have held back from my aspirations.

    If you do not journey toward me, where will you go?

  17. And if you do not visit the lord of praiseworthy deeds and intelligence,

    then what young man but al-Khatib will you visit?

  18. I said, “Yes, my master: meeting him is my heart’s desire,

    but my fortune falls short of that.”

  19. The Mediterranean has barred me from his abode,

    while around me surge oceans of mighty longing.

  20. They have an abyss rising like the abyss of his bounty toward me;

    its shoulder looms where the drowning man lies captive.

  21. Yet passion’s fire burns in the hearth of my heart,

    and from it a sigh has risen around my heart—

  22. a sigh mimicking the steam by which

    our vessels fly over the seas.

  23. They fly—as does my heart, journeying toward a sanctuary

    belonging to him; on earnest endeavor’s wing I shall travel.

  24. I shall travel and slake my thirst, if what I seek

    is a matter the gracious God will make easy.

Sol 5.6