Sol 6

  1. O champion of the Romans among their patricians,

    And wisdom of the Romans in their writings,

  2. Is there in you both strong support

    For one whose life is departing, or almost departing?

  3. Suddenly hidden from his sight

    Was the best thing he had counted on to mend it.

  4. How my breast burns over calamities and what

    They conceal unseen of their disasters!

  5. I was suddenly driven from my garden

    At the moment I felt safest among its groves.

  6. While I listened to the cooing of its dove,

    The croak of its crow startled my heart.

  7. Qasim left me for his final journey;

    How my soul grieves at his departure!

  8. He vanished from sight, yet in my thoughts

    He is closer to my soul than one embracing it.

  9. How many people, though far away, become

    Closer to the soul than those beside it.

  10. How my soul grieves for the one who brought it success!

    How my soul grieves for the one who suited it!

  11. He was a life made clear by well-being;

    Its enjoyer was far from ever tiring of it.

  12. Can the full moon replace our master's face?

    No, nor can the sun at its rising.

  13. Can the full moon replace the light of his laughter

    When night gives way to its flashes?

  14. Can the rain replace his two generous hands for us?

    No, nor can it replace his character or its maker.

  15. Can the sea replace what surges

    In his thoughts, down to their fine subtleties?

  16. A young man who, when difficulties became tangled,

    Split falsehoods away from their truths.

  17. A man of character whose promises have always

    Kept faithfully to their appointed times.

  18. By God, but for my fear of ill omen,

    My eyes would pour my heart's blood from their sockets.

  19. Yet tears are for another, while his hopes

    Remain obedient to their guide.

  20. May life cast him into its later years

    While he stays among the leaders in the race for glory.

  21. O my drinking companions, may I never lose you,

    O my soul's chosen friends!

  22. After you, I divorced pleasures; now I have

    Come to hope for the return of what I divorced.

  23. Since you left, my cup has stood unused;

    It has not followed its usual course with me.

  24. Its evening drinker is distracted, and its morning drinker

    Is as heedless of it as the evening drinker.

  25. The lute and flute are silent together,

    Or accompany a tear and its flowing.

  26. You departed as spring drew to its end,

    And the earth weeps for its anemones.

  27. Your departure gave it cause to mourn

    Beyond all the brightness that had faded from it.

  28. Baghdad has no sorrow but your absence,

    Nor anything to long for but your memory.

  29. Bear it with grace: she is in the first bloom of

    Life, though its heat must come.

  30. Yet her late afternoons offer hope;

    May God keep their obstacles from us.

  31. It is as though the singing women are already singing to us,

    Like wide-eyed oryx among the sandhills.

  32. Each graceful one, when she takes up the

    Melodies, surpasses their practiced performers.

  33. By God's trust, she is worth the weight of the

    Earth, all that covers it and its Creator.

  34. Do convey to the one in whom we place our hopes

    The greeting of one whose parched heart trembles.

  35. And tell him truthfully

    Of one whose soul hopes in him and trusts him,

  36. One who spreads his praise whenever groups meet;

    Through him, musk has filled their nostrils.

  37. I swear, Abu al-Husayn, by your

    Favors, I am no one who effaces them.

  38. If injustice from you should burden my soul,

    My master's injustice does not overwhelm it.

  39. How many favors of yours, though he will not acknowledge them,

    Are proclaimed by the dust their radiance raises!

  40. O you who steal the finest of his deeds,

    Your master, while he lives, is no thief of them.

  41. One who claims a lofty station, though his inner self holds virtues

    That God knows he does not surpass.

  42. He began seeking eminence, and I said to him:

    Leave the splendors of eminence to the one worthy of them.

  43. O you who profess love of eminence in hypocrisy,

    It is far beyond the hypocrite's reach.

  44. Do not try to deceive a discerning woman

    Who withholds her pure favor from one who dilutes it.

  45. Do not imagine that she will befriend

    Anyone in times to come but her true friend.

  46. Love will never join wealth and eminence;

    The lover of wealth is no lover of her.

  47. Entrust her guardianship to Qasim,

    And leave the beloved to her lover.

  48. He whose qualities have always been

    Sweeter than slender waists within their belts.

  49. Take these verses like a maiden's pearls strung together,

    Or grains of musk in necklaces.

  50. And I shall add further passages to them,

    Joining later verses to earlier ones.

  51. May travelers never miss their intended way

    By turning toward sedition and its crier.

  52. And let those who stray turn from reckless ventures;

    Whoever enters them meets ruin at their hands.

  53. God's caliphate among the kings of the sons of

    Abbas is among the best gifts its Giver bestowed.

  54. A house in whose members you never lack sound judgment,

    Whether in its mature men or its youths.

  55. For forbearance and learning dwell among its elders,

    And generosity and courage among its young nobles.

  56. It is enough that their caliphate now has

    The son of Sulayman as its sustaining bond,

  57. And that his favor and gifts

    Help those who seek distinction.

  58. What a honeyed bee you have in him,

    And what a snake he is within its pavilion!

  59. Through him, the affairs of a kingdom were set straight

    After crookedness, and its bonds were drawn together.

  60. His handling of its crises seems like

    Uprooting mountains that resist the one who pulls them.

  61. There the crises grew great, and their

    Proud chess kings rose above their pawns.

  62. In its war, his pen is reckoned

    To clear a path for the spear in narrow places.

  63. Through him, the bewildered wielder of swords finds his way

    From men's heads to the parts in their hair.

  64. In his protection he is stronger than the wall of any lofty

    Walled city, and stronger than its trenches.

  65. How many turns of fortune make time itself take fright

    Yet find its people preparing him to meet them!

  66. How often he has opened a path to right guidance

    And closed the way to error!

  67. Men's cunning meets his stratagem

    And seems feebler than the simplest fool.

  68. With his resourcefulness he leaves the resourceful man

    No different from a witless simpleton.

  69. He hurls a great stratagem of his own making

    Against a great stratagem of theirs.

  70. How often he has challenged fate on slippery ground

    And never slipped from its treacherous footing!

  71. How often he has raised clouds of bounty and destruction

    For the seeker of a state's favor and for its transgressor!

  72. Then he rains rescue on the righteous

    And thunderbolts on the people's wicked.

  73. O family of Wahb, through you ranks have risen

    So high that desire falls short of their heights.

  74. O house whose members have always won praise,

    Reproach turns aside from their characters.

  75. They have gone so far that our blame cannot catch them;

    Nor, indeed, can our praise get ahead of them.

  76. Your tested worth proves noble amid the trials

    Of the nights and their crushing blows.

  77. You are like finely tempered blades

    Whose polish reveals their finest qualities.

  78. Through you, the renown of kingship and kings

    Has become more fragrant than musk in parted hair.

  79. Your champion outstripped the age in a race

    That time itself pursues without catching him.

  80. The kings of our community drew alongside its bonds;

    There you stood among its firm supports.

  81. Thus, from among you, it relied

    On one who could open its affairs and bind them together.

  82. It entrusted him with preserving the order of its state

    And all the duties connected with it.

  83. It charged him with supporting its barren lands

    And entrusted him with outwitting its rebel.

  84. So he lifted poverty from our shoulders

    And lifted worry from the state's shoulders.

  85. The running distinguished its neighing horses

    From those that had only brayed.

  86. Have no fear; you will remain secure

    So long as fruit ripens on tall palms.

  87. You have made your generosity your fortresses

    Against the nights and their sudden blows.

  88. One who makes generosity his fortress

    Is safer than mountain goats on their high peaks.

  89. Your favors among the people have caught

    God's watchful eye as it watches those who observe them.

  90. And a company skilled at praising you

    Owes its skill to your glory.

  91. If their master poets praised anyone else,

    Blame would stop short of their eloquent tongues.

  92. How many praises would fall silent if they passed you by!

    You have given their speakers reason to speak.

  93. And how many praises would be lies if they passed you by!

    You have given their speakers reason to speak truth.

  94. How could minds fail to bring forth for you

    Poetry's serving girls in their tunics?

  95. With others, even what sells lies unsold;

    Under your protection, what languishes finds a market.

  96. Yet I must speak of a flash

    From you whose rain has poured on another.

  97. Your justice, O rain cloud, whose lightning I have long

    Watched while sleep forsook my eyes!

  98. Shall I seek your shelter against the age's injuries

    While my bones become food for one who gnaws them?

  99. By God, my honor is not there to be crushed

    Among you, nor my dignity to be breached.

Sol 6