Sol 6.1

  1. Lightning gleams between the pearls and their cool sheen,

    In his jewel-like mouth, dark-lipped and cool-toothed.

  2. It parts in a smile to reveal jewels of pure-white pearls,

    And carnelian and rubies, and bubbles,

  3. And clear water, and musk, and hail,

    And daisies, and wine, and white honey.

  4. In his mouth, pearls are embedded in rubies,

    As jewels are set in pure gold and gold.

  5. The musk-scented breath from this mouth intoxicates,

    Leaving none sober among non-Arabs or Arabs.

  6. His saliva is lawful wine; fortunate is its sipper.

    It heals hearts of pain and illness.

  7. Love's companion grows more distraught with each sip,

    As air increases the fire's flame.

  8. Whoever tastes it loses all restraint toward it;

    Each time he tastes, his palate persists in seeking more.

  9. Excellent is the clear wine born of the mouth,

    And vile the wine born of the cup and grapes.

  10. A maiden passes it round within the mouth's cup,

    A full moon of beauty that neither wanes nor sets.

  11. She intoxicates people, playing with their souls,

    Through dancing, ecstasy, love-madness, and rapture.

  12. A gazelle of beauty—how sweet his qualities!

    Though her lover grows gray, love does not.

  13. He hunts the lions of the thicket with his beautiful face;

    They have no way to escape him by flight.

  14. I fell in love with him, a fawn, through his turning glances;

    I lost my heart, and my reason was taken captive by him.

  15. My heart melted in love for him, with passion and anguish;

    Without love, by God, the heart would not melt.

  16. Love consumes the inward parts with burning,

    As fire consumes wood by scorching.

  17. He possesses three waters without equal,

    Counted as beauties by non-Arabs and Arabs:

  18. The water of modesty, the water of beauty, and likewise

    The water of life in his mouth, which heals the ailing.

  19. A sun of beauty appeared on beauty's horizon,

    But in its beauty it neither suffered eclipse nor set.

  20. Oh, the beauty of his forehead beneath his forelock!

    Light gleams from it, unveiled.

  21. A full moon, veiled at night by his halo;

    Yet it has appeared through the most delicate veils.

  22. And the cheek's rounded prominence, rising radiant,

    Bears roses and indeed surpasses Abu Lahab.

  23. And above the cheek, lashes in their luxuriance:

    Rosebuds, without doubt or misgiving.

  24. The cheek-down is nothing but a line upon his cheek,

    Inscribed in emerald upon ruby.

  25. The mole, when it appears upon his cheek, is only

    A carat of musk upon a dinar of gold.

  26. The scorpion of his temple—how many lovers its sting

    Has cast into ruin in love through its bite!

  27. His dark, bright-eyed gaze, kohl-lined in deep blackness,

    Has appeared a marvel—what a marvel!

  28. An arrow for shooting, and, for slaughtering hearts,

    A sword; and for the mind, an undisguised spell.

  29. How often, between earnestness and jest, has it shed blood,

    And taken away the soul between earnestness and play!

  30. Drowsy, drunk on the wine of slumber, it spins

    A robe of wasting for the lovesick and ailing body.

  31. His stature is a branch, swaying gracefully in rhythm,

    With the sway of one enraptured, not one agitated.

  32. I said, 'Join me, for separation has destroyed me;

    Is there a reason for your forsaking me, my master?'

  33. He said, 'Union with me is forbidden; I will not permit it,

    And separation is recommended, even if not obligatory.'

  34. I said, 'If the law of love has forbidden it,

    Alas for a wasted life in which I never attained my aim!

  35. And if union with me is forbidden in love, oh,

    How constantly I confuse Sha'ban with Rajab over it!'

  36. So may God firmly establish endurance in my heart;

    Nothing equals patience within a despondent heart.

  37. I have remained aflame with yearning in love's fire;

    May God never cool a burning heart from it.

  38. I never cease wandering through time in longing,

    Crossing the desert wastes as an exile roams.

  39. I mount the black steed of pitch-dark night in its gloom,

    Nor give my riders respite from riding it.

  40. I converse with the star all night, sleepless,

    But it does not know the anguish I endure.

  41. I recite to it an uninterrupted account of longing,

    An authentic account, without fabrication or lies,

  42. Until I see the dominion of dawn appear,

    Erasing the dominion of darkness and stars.

  43. The sun rises in its most radiant rising places,

    Like the sun of eminence rising in the loftiest ranks,

  44. From glory's summit, above might, in nobility,

    On fortune's brow, from eminence's spacious constellation,

  45. Clad in excellence and beneficence, in refinement,

    And adorned with glory, eminence, and ancestral worth,

  46. Adorned with beauty in outward form and character,

    With delicacy of disposition, gentleness, and courtesy.

  47. With the broadest prestige, gracious forbearance accompanies him;

    Oh, the benefit of prestige accompanied by fine forbearance!

  48. In exalted rank, with high distinction serving it,

    And the utmost pride in person and lineage.

  49. Chief of the nobles, who bow before him

    Heads that forever strike against the clouds.

  50. Whoever has likened another to him in glory

    Cannot distinguish the head from the tail.

  51. In one like him, ancestors and possessions find their pride;

    Others boast of ancestors and possessions.

  52. If they magnify a child's pride in his father,

    Greater still is a father's pride in his children.

  53. Though he came after kin who preceded him

    And founded glory above the sun and stars,

  54. God favored him among them; there is no wonder:

    How many prophets preceded the best of prophets!

  55. There is nothing strange in his being of them yet surpassing them;

    Sweet sugar, after all, comes from cane.

  56. He is the glory of the sons of eminence in honor,

    And their glory among men of the pen and sword,

  57. Their pride in lineage among men of noble descent,

    And their crown of worth among men of ancestral merit.

  58. High honors have hailed him as the son of their valor;

    He surpassed Kisra and whoever equaled Abu Karib.

  59. High honors made him the full moon of their procession;

    He attained the noblest rank—Ali, the exalted.

  60. A gallant youth; among mankind no youth is like Ali.

    Chivalry has been his finest lineage.

  61. The light of courage appears above his forehead,

    And lions behold from him the darkness of anguish.

  62. Should they taste him for a moment, even in imagination,

    They taste death after tasting fear and dread.

  63. A lion of combat, a lion of battle, a hero:

    You constantly smell from him a breath of terror.

  64. In every hair follicle of his there is a lion,

    As though he were a lion in a forest of hills.

  65. Thus, if his enemies saw him alone,

    They would see him, by God, as a clamorous army.

  66. The lion of the thicket, Akkar's fortress and defense:

    Whoever shoots arrows of ill at it will miss.

  67. Can enemies seek to take it, even in imagination,

    When its wall is built of pliant spears and swords?

  68. Rather, its greatest wall, towering above a stronghold,

    Is the lion's renown, lofty in worth and rank.

  69. A champion who, when he meets his peers in combat, aims

    On battle's day to seize souls, not plunder.

  70. He attacks with a lance whose spearhead cuts life short,

    Leaving no tyrant's life untruncated.

  71. With his lance he milks blood from the enemies' breast,

    And the lance returns sated from the milking.

  72. He attacks with a sword whose flash melts the soul,

    And snatches the soul from the entrails of one stripped of it.

  73. You see the enemies' necks, when he strikes them,

    Like down beneath his unsheathed Indian blade.

  74. Streaming coral weeps for the enemies' necks;

    Oh, the beauty of tears streaming from necks!

  75. How often he decked the men in red garments, just as

    He adorned their women with indigo and mourning robes.

  76. They rose to dance, beating their knees

    And tearing their necklines, singing with clamor.

  77. They began scattering pearls from her eyelids

    That spared the earth a downpour from the rain clouds.

  78. In his war, the enemies turned back with a turning

    Wretched indeed in the market of war and despoilment.

  79. Their flesh is for wild beasts, their eyes for birds;

    Yes, and their bones are for the fire, like firewood.

  80. The sea of bounty and generosity seeping from his palm

    Exceeds the capacity of pages and books.

  81. His tongue never slackens, through all time,

    In ordering his treasurer: 'Bestow, give, grant!'

  82. He has no fault save loving to give generously,

    And hating to hoard wealth and possessions.

  83. He assails wealth and destroys it by giving,

    Sparing neither silver nor gold,

  84. Nor anything else that he possesses;

    If he owned the soul, he would give it unasked.

  85. If Hatim of Tayy has become a byword,

    And those like him who passed in bygone ages,

  86. This sea's generosity abrogates theirs,

    As Taha's law abrogates every prophet's law.

  87. O lord whose ascendant is auspicious,

    May the full moon of his eminence never set through all time.

  88. O dignified one, whose overwhelming awe

    Makes the lions of the thicket kneel before him;

  89. Rather, they remain standing on their feet

    Before him, even if weary with exhaustion.

  90. To you comes a lovely, tender maiden, secluded

    Within a chamber of beauty, erected on firm craftsmanship.

  91. Peerless, with Beauty her father, who cradles her,

    A lovely virgin, neither deflowered nor possessed,

  92. A graceful virgin bride who, through her eloquence,

    Exults in beauty above her amorous peers.

  93. She grows fragrant through praising you: musk has anointed her;

    Without anointing with this musk, she would not be fragrant.

  94. Grant her acceptance, brother of eminence, with a smile;

    Your smile for her lifts the veils.

  95. Be safe, and remain happy in good health,

    Your body sound, free of sickness and fatigue,

  96. As long as a branch sways and the ringdove speaks

    Above the branches, offering the finest sermons;

  97. As long as a star shines and a sun rises,

    As long as lightning gleams between the pearls and their cool sheen.

Sol 6.1