شِعرُ مَيتٍ أَتاكَ في لَفظِ حَيٍّ

صارَ بَينَ الحَياةِ وَالمَوتِ وَقفا

The poetry of a dead man has come to you with the diction of the living

The verse of a dead man comes to you, in the utterance of the living,

It has become poised between life and death

Caught in a standstill between life and death.

أَنحَلَت جِسمَهُ الحَوادِثُ حَتّى

كادَ عَن أَعيُنِ الحَوادِثِ يَخفى

Misfortunes unraveled his body until

Calamities have wasted his body away, until

He almost vanished from the eyes of misfortunes

He is all but hidden from Calamity's own eyes.

لَو تَأَمَّلتَني لِتُثبِتَ وَجهي

لَم تَبِن مِن كِتابِ وَجهِيَ حَرفا

If you contemplated me to affirm my face

Were you to gaze intently to discern my face,

You would not glean a letter from the book of my face

You would not distinguish a single letter from its book.

وَلَكَرَّرتَ طَرفَ عَينِكَ فيمَن

قَد بَراهُ السَقامُ حَتّى تَعَفّى

And you would repeat glancing at the one

And you would cast your glance again and again at one

Whom illness has emaciated until he wastes away

Whom sickness has worn down until he is effaced.