Sol 5.6

  1. I see a flash of lightning shining from between your teeth,

    Its radiance illuminating West and East.

  2. It left the color of night as white as dawn,

    Though it had been black as the day of parting.

  3. You smiled at us, revealing pearls set in carnelian,

    And the light of their pure jewel sparkled there.

  4. Your teeth show us wine-bubbles within a mouth

    That delicately resembles the cup, yet is the very truth made manifest.

  5. Come, then—let us taste the nectar, flowing smooth:

    Your saliva, I mean, not well-aged wine.

  6. Pass it round to us generously, for now serene

    Is the age of serenity; hasten with it and give freely.

  7. Deny not, O Kaaba of beauty, the one for whom

    The world folded its distances toward you on yearning’s mounts.

  8. For the days have no delight but wine

    Passed round to the cooing of the ring-necked dove,

  9. In a garden where, whenever its pool’s water is hidden,

    It trickles among the tamarisks’ roots so long as any remains.

  10. Birds call back and forth above its branches,

    As though the leaves were finely patterned embroidery.

  11. When the gardens embrace within it, they are startled by

    Narcissus blooms gazing at them like wide-open eyes.

  12. And though the basil hides the secret of its fragrance,

    The tale-bearer spreads it at every crossroads.

  13. And when the river tells the pebbles of its clarity,

    The willow leans toward it like one with bowed head.

  14. The breeze comes and goes with its perfume,

    So the branches now part in smiles, now meet.

  15. The clouds pour pearls upon it as though they were

    Necklaces of praise for al-Sa‘id, the Divinely Favored—

  16. He is al-Muhsin, the sought one of the house of Muhsin,

    And the noblest of those who aspire to glory and ascend;

  17. The one who scattered his enemies at every crossroads

    And split their skulls in every army.

  18. He kept up the night march: the Arabs beneath his banner

    Surround him, and the Turks beneath a sanjak.

  19. The earth’s breast narrows at the multitude of his army,

    While the beleaguered enemy’s heart spreads wide.

  20. Were his enemies to take the stars as refuge,

    He would invade them on meteors of fleet horses.

  21. His charge teaches those steeds the art of pursuit,

    With his banners, from one battle-pass to the next.

  22. A youth never seen on battle’s day turning aside

    The rein of a bay horse or the bit of a piebald,

  23. When the slender sword blazes amid the fray

    And quenches its thirst with rippling blood.

  24. You see flashes of keen steel amid a cloud of dust,

    And a surging flood of blood between the hills.

  25. O plunderer of lives, yet never unjust!

    O giver of wealth, best of all who spend!

  26. O gatherer of every glory into one, encompassing

    All creation with bounty freely spread!

  27. Your right hand and the Yemeni sword—in the two are the

    Hopes and deaths of the fortunate and the wretched.

  28. No day has passed whose morning you cleft open

    Without pouring out copious bounty and cleaving skulls.

  29. Your petitioner comes seeking; your enemy turns back—

    How excellent is what mankind hopes from you and fears!

  30. Through you, O son of al-‘Abdali, keen ambitions rose,

    Ascending above the crowns of the Pleiades.

  31. Take her, an amorous maiden eloquently expressing your virtues:

    Her eloquence has silenced every fluent tongue.

  32. I am only one who strings the pearls of thought,

    And in what I say I neither plagiarize nor steal.

  33. It is nothing but the honor of my face, which I preserve

    By keeping my diction free of fabricated speech.

  34. So do not rank one like me with the worst of some rabble:

    Even Orion’s belt falls short of my eloquence.

  35. If some ignoramus objects to my prosody

    And assails my honor like a threadbare robe,

  36. May I never have composed poetry if through it I do not

    Tear that honor utterly to shreds,

  37. So everyone in East and West may know that I

    Slapped Jarir before al-Farazdaq could slap him.

  38. So long as Abdullah remains my treasure and refuge,

    And my support, I shall satisfy my soul against every fool.

  39. Here she is for you, O grandson of Ibn ‘Awn; she has sought your shelter,

    Swaying coyly in ornaments of brilliant thought.

  40. The stars of my original conceits, in a sky of eloquence,

    Glow proudly with a light shining from your glories.

  41. When their sound reaches a young man’s ear, their grace

    Works upon him as clarified, pure wine does.

  42. She passes round a cup of your virtues, whose seal is

    Wafts of musk, made still more fragrant by praises.

Sol 5.6