Sol 6.1

  1. Those gazelles, whose eyelids have kept you sleepless,

    have tears with which their eyes watered the dune's bān trees.

  2. By God, a heart whose blaze will never dwindle

    and be quenched—and an eye whose tear ducts never dry!

  3. My two friends, here is the valley—but where are its gazelles?

    And those are Najd's hills—but where are their dwellers?

  4. Love is only a drunkenness whose hangover I bear,

    for a herd of oryx gone far away, while my sorrows for them remain.

  5. Their slender beauties carried off my heart at the hour of parting,

    and their wide-eyed ones kept my eyes awake on the night of anguish.

  6. I am powerless against beauties and deserts: these

    now torment me with parting, those with their intervening distance.

  7. For there are pearls, guarded by the shells of cheeks,

    and a sea of mirage, with riding-camels as its ships.

  8. May I be rid of the winds! The east breeze passed the slender maidens,

    so their upper bodies swayed, and their backs grew supple.

  9. And a dusky maiden whose figure bends with youth's intoxication:

    she lacks neither the spear-shaft's hue nor its suppleness.

  10. She draws near, yet between us, through her boredom,

    lies a gulf whose remoteness brings the fickle one no closer.

  11. It is hard for me to gain redress for her heart's cruelty

    when my own love-crazed heart comes to her aid.

  12. I have nothing but an infatuation steeped in ignorance;

    so I see no resting place for my good sense where you are concerned.

  13. I reproach my heart over you, though longing is its law,

    and drive my soul away from you, though passion is its creed.

  14. And on many a morning—how many mornings and joys

    I wish, though I treasure them, could be that one!—

  15. I was alone with her, the wine-cup's veil cast aside,

    while dark clouds had veiled the face of the sky.

  16. And her left hand lay between my side and the bedding,

    and her right hand lay above my wildly fluttering heart.

  17. I sipped with her the two wines: saliva and grape-wine.

    And oh, what a wine—may its vine never wither!

  18. They rose like stars, traveling with the darkness;

    when they drew near, their companion complained of no sorrow.

  19. And bubbles circled around them, as though

    Ibn Ayyub had appeared, and their eyes overflowed.

Sol 6.1