إن طيفا يزورني في المنام — Albohtry

Indeed, a phantom that visits me in sleep

is quite free of my anguish and passion.

A tender maiden, for whose sake I spent the night bearing reproach;

and a lover's torment is prolonged reproach.

She looked at me furtively, and struck

my body with sickness through her eye's glance.

Made feminine, then masculine, she has the coquetry

of a gentle maiden and the figure of a boy.

And lawful beauty has a special merit when

forbidden charm mingles with it in the eyes.

She has given me drink from her cup and her mouth:

what quenches the lovesick one's burning thirst.

In a temperate season, she rivals

it, mirroring it in the balance of her form.

True living is for the nights to be

longer than the days.

The expanse of air has cleared, and delightful is

the delicacy of water blended into the wine.

And al-Sabih was completed at the finest time;

it is an abode of delight and a place to dwell.

Facing al-Malih, and if it could

speak, it would greet it openly with peace.

Both were clothed in splendor, and this one faced

that one: one laughing, the other smiling.

Like two lovers who, if they could meet,

would embrace and hold each other to excess.

The wind runs its course between its two extremities,

then stumbles from lassitude and weariness.

It draws its supply through a channel from the surging

water, like a white, polished, keen-edged sword.

And when it enters the middle of the green pool,

the pool casts upon it the marble's hue.

You see it as though it were seawater,

deceiving the eye, though it is water from clouds.

And the waterwheels, as they turn, with no water-drawer

to supply water through them but the 'ostrich' well-frames,

are marvels made for the one among God's servants most entitled

to the Corner, al-Safa, and the Station.

Indeed, the finest of palaces has been bestowed,

against the enemies' will, upon the finest of mankind.

It neighbors al-Ja'fari, and Shibdaz has drawn

close to it, like an eager chooser.

Abodes among the royal residences, like stars

gleaming in the blackness of night.

They leave one speechless, defying description, and cannot

be grasped except through conjecture and illusion.

So it is as though we sense them in our wishes,

or see them in dreams that visit by night.

Chambers built for faith and worldly life,

for which God ordains the imam's reward.

They have made us yearn for Paradise, so we have increased

our avoidance of sins and transgressions.

Through them you surpass the ancients in kingship,

and vie in glory with those who rival Islam in numbers.

May God bless the caliph in exalted

glory and noble achievements,

and show him his hopes fulfilled in the heirs

apparent, men of loyalty and generosity.

May they ever remain in felicity and joy,

and in the continuance and permanence of his reign.