كَم لَيلَةٍ ذاتِ أَبراجٍ وَأَروِقَةٍ

كَاليَمِّ تَقذِفُ أَمواجاً بِأَمواجِ

How many a night with towers and galleries

How many a night, adorned with constellations and high arcades,

Like a turbulent sea casting wave upon wave

Vast as the ocean, casting wave upon crashing wave,

سَمَرتُها بَرَشاً كَالغُصنِ يَجذِبُهُ

دِعصُ النَقا في بَياضٍ مِنهُ رَجراجِ

I whiled it away with a branch, like a bough attracting

I passed in conversation with a fawn, slender as a willow bough,

The fawns amidst the bright flashes of lightning

Weighed down by hips like a quivering dune of white sand.

وَسنانُ في فَمِهِ سِمطانِ مِن بَرَدٍ

عَذبٍ وَفي خَدِّهِ تُفّاحَتا عاجِ

With teeth in his mouth like icicles of delicious coolness

With languid eyes, and in his mouth two rows of icy hail,

And apple-red cheeks

Sweet to the taste, and in his cheeks two apples of ivory.

كَأَنَّما وَجهُهُ وَالشَعرُ مُلبِسُهُ

بَدرٌ تَنَفَّسَ في ذي ظُلمَةٍ داجِ

As though his face and the hair clothing him

As though his face, framed by the cloak of his flowing hair,

Were a full moon breathing in intense darkness

Were a full moon breathing light into the pitch-black gloom.

أَخَذتُ غِرَّتَهُ وَالسُكرُ يوهِمُهُ

أَن قَد نَجا وَهُوَ مِنّي غَيرَ ما ناجِ

I took away his sobriety, and drunkenness deceived him

I seized his unguarded moment, while intoxication beguiled him

That he had escaped, while he had not escaped from me

Into thinking he was safe, though from me there was no escape.

فَظَلَّ يَسقي بِماءِ الوَردِ مِن أَسَفٍ

وَرداً وَيَلطِمُ ديباجاً بِديباجِ

So he remained watering a rose with drops of sorrow

In his regret, he began to water roses with rosewater,

And rending brocade with brocade

And to strike the brocade of his cheek with the brocade of his hand.

وَظَلتُ مِن حَسَناتِ الدَهرِ في مَهَلٍ

حَتّى أَبانَت عُيونُ الصُبحِ إِزعاجي

And I remained a while, of the beautiful ones of time

And so I lingered, savoring the fleeting favors of fortune,

Until the eyes of dawn disturbed me

Until the eyes of dawn signaled my disquiet.