Sol 5.6

  1. O Thurayya, if you return to the mea—

    —dow, do not ask the nightingales about us.

  2. They are not those we knew—the ones who once

    sang for us as we ourselves sang.

  3. These nightingales failed to recognize us when

    they found us unmoved by their song,

  4. trilling to us in every alien strain,

    foreign in wording, meaning, and melody.

  5. O Thurayya, the meadow has changed; the warb—

    —ler in it is not the one we knew.

  6. No Arab nightingale remains within the grove

    after us to comfort the afflicted heart.

  7. That was an age now gone, so do not recall it.

    God have mercy on our time, when we had

  8. given up all hope—and it was enough for us

    if you would only accept our greeting.

Sol 5.6