Sol 5.6

  1. My gaze is empty of you, yet my inmost heart is your dwelling.

    My affairs, with separation drawing near, are grave indeed.

  2. You encompass a beauty from which cruelty has never parted,

    and a loveliness that kindness has never accompanied.

  3. My gaze—and the rounded hip swayed, and your stature trembled, up—

    —right and erect; moon, dune, and willow stood bewildered.

  4. Thus two things resemble each other in the image: a lance and a figure;

    and in my heart, a spearhead and a languid-eyed beauty are alike.

  5. Beware, beloved, my heart and the flood of my tears:

    for my heart and my weeping eye are fire and deluge.

  6. The breeze betrayed her to me by spreading her fragrance.

    Alas for precious beauties—how can one be safe from a habitual traitor?

  7. In love we stood as though in pagan ignorance,

    with Suʿdā and those stars as idols.

  8. Oryx-eyed beauties captivated us with their graceful sway and beauty,

    so we said: supple figures—yet they are branches.

  9. They surely ensnared us, their eyelids serving as traps.

    One marvel is that gazelles should capture lions!

  10. Would that her eyelids had not scorned my sickness;

    for my sickness is the outward mark of love concealed within.

  11. O you who blame my tears on the day of Suwayqa,

    did souls journey away, or merely litters and caravans?

  12. They are tears, yet tears cannot quench a burning anguish;

    and there is blame—but where can I find consolation?

  13. Her eyelids have made fresh traces among love’s ruins,

    through what her glances and eyelids have done to us.

  14. I burden my heart with a load it cannot bear—

    can two opposites, love and concealment, coexist?

  15. She visited us as a phantom, while sleep beguiled her;

    yet her phantom brought nothing but passion and sorrows.

  16. Longing rejects all but my avowal of her love;

    even in ardent passion, people have different creeds.

  17. I wander madly toward her, though beauties are many;

    but what does a thirsty wanderer seek except the watering-place?

  18. I yearn for Nuʿmān and the bygone days of her covenant,

    though Nuʿmān’s dunes yield nothing but grief.

  19. It is forbidden for lips to kiss her earth,

    though hems and sleeves that trail upon it breathe fragrance.

  20. Whenever my eye rains upon it with a cloudburst,

    may no cloud’s eye rain upon it, however abundantly.

  21. How did she find her way through a night of hair and darkness

    to my bed, while the western star stood bewildered?

  22. My heart never doubted that Bilqīs, Queen of Sheba, had come,

    and that Solomon, bearer of the mightiest crown, was in the palace.

  23. He is the ever-revolving firmament among delegations and enemies;

    in his palm lie sustenance and deprivation for all creation.

  24. His fingertips, in every drought and crisis,

    are seas, while all the earth’s seas are but bays within them.

  25. A beacon of guidance, reviver of generosity, slayer of foes:

    when a lavish host at evening meals is hard to find, he is a mighty spear-thruster.

  26. I think the generosity within him is a delight to many a people;

    otherwise, why does he bestow largesse while exultant?

  27. The phrasing of his praise is sweet to the ears—

    is it fluent speech, or is it melody?

  28. Though Egypt has recognized the proofs of his excellence,

    Khurasan surely knows what Egypt proclaims.

  29. His generosity has a law: wealth may be slain through bounty;

    such killing is lawful, though killing under sacred law is aggression.

  30. The sword’s companion thirsts for his enemies’ lifeblood,

    while the impassioned man drinks his fill from the water of smiling welcome.

  31. A youth whose every deed, in every circumstance, is praised—

    so every eloquent man in creation becomes a Ḥassān in his praise.

  32. Had he lived in an age long bygone,

    none would have claimed that turbans were crowns.

  33. Ask the tongues of illustrious men about his deadly exploits

    on the morning when the two hosts—unbelief and faith—met.

  34. There, amid battle, the wounds of armored warriors

    were watering-places, and the slender brown spears their well-ropes.

  35. The lances seemed willow branches, while their blades

    were streams, and the closely woven coats of mail were ponds.

  36. There the warriors’ red blood was mingled with

    the water of keen swords, while spearheads were sweet basil.

  37. When the sword sang with a rustle among heads and necks,

    his spear swayed, drunk with triumph.

  38. He turned the bow aside, content with its service,

    and how often time passed beneath him in a rage.

  39. With moons of night whose breastbones were halos around them—

    lions borne by eagles among the horses.

  40. Had the dust he raised not made it night,

    no naked sword could have traveled through it.

  41. He gives up a soul whose equal no one else would give;

    thus the lives of the hunted are the price of glory.

  42. They are the men who defended high honor with lofty spears.

    How fiercely they attacked, and how nobly they preserved it!

  43. Obeyed in peace, spear-thrusters in war;

    in drought and amid cloud masses, they are rain-showers and horsemen.

  44. When they fight, they annihilate; when they wage war, they are harsh.

    When they bestow, they enrich; when they make peace, they grow gentle.

  45. When a tyrant attends the banquet served by their white blades,

    he has no companion there but regret.

  46. At dawn, the galloping of horses is thunder, and the swords’

    flashing is lightning, while the arrows’ downpour is abundant and unceasing.

  47. They raised me above having to answer the blows of fortune;

    when calamity addresses me, I have leisure and eloquence.

  48. My rank among them has passed beyond Gemini,

    so my station and Saturn stand equal in the heights.

  49. Since my merit among them is not obscure,

    how could it fail to possess renown?

  50. It is nothing but dawn amid mankind’s darkness,

    and far be it from dawn to require proof.

  51. Kingship is only a form, and he is its spirit;

    time itself is only an eye, and he its pupil.

Sol 5.6