أحاجيك هل للحب كالدار تجمع — Albohtry

I pose you a riddle: is there, for love, anything like a home that gathers,

and for the thirsting wanderer, anything like water that quenches?

Did their sudden parting escort the departing caravans

like a streaming eye that bleeds with anguish when it weeps?

Did not the encamped tribe alarm you with their abandonment,

and at dawn will their dispersal not alarm you still more?

Yes—and an apparition of Athila, whenever

I sigh from longing, appears and awakens hope.

Whenever a visit from it ends with sleep,

I awaken, frightened by its absence.

My eye sees, in meeting it, what it does not see,

and my ear hears the echo of what it does not hear.

An imagined falsehood suffices you in place of truth,

bringing back the grieving soul, so that it returns.

Must there be no yielding in one part

of life without another part holding back?

Youth's bounty has become scattered plunder,

though once it was a gathered treasure.

When I stoop, I stoop by drawing near to a goal

of little worth; yet I see myself rich when I am content.

Take your share in the two noble virtues, for only

through generosity and courage does a young man attain eminence.

Small is a bow's usefulness, though its stock is nabʿ-wood,

if the arm of the man who shoots it is castor-wood.

So do not pay the utmost price for a sword

to make it strike: the heart, not the sword, does the cutting.

If you wish, a weakling will win fortune instead of you,

and a mutilated slave will contest your shares with you.

And what Ibn Yalbakh bestowed on me was nothing

but a venomous sting drawn from poison's side.

Truly, hardship is nothing but awaiting it,

and what is expected is more grievous than what has befallen.

Lions sometimes stop short of their prey

when sated, but assail their prey when hungry.

When the Khabur bars the way of our steeds,

in squadrons, the vile woman's son is more abased in cheek.

And in the cavalry's vanguard lies my fortunate alliance

with a proud man who guards my sanctuary and wards off harm.

We wrestle calamities away from us when they strike,

with his help, though his arm is occupied, and so we throw them down.

With one beneath his rightful rank, even as he rises,

and cheated of his share, even as he is deceived.

When the guilty band seek refuge in his pardon,

he enfolds them in forgiveness, his courtyard thronged, his means ample.

They are accustomed to his pardon, though against them

lie offenses in which yesterday they showed favoritism and neglect.

Yet Khurasan did not obtain from them what

it had spent some time looking toward expectantly.

The utmost of what is feared and hoped for is encompassed

by their conjecture about what great deeds he will perform.

By the good fortune of glory, al-ʿAlaʾ ibn Ṣaʿid

has risen ever upward, attaining its furthest reach and surmounting it.

He guarded the kingdom in all its quarters; and early astir

over kingship is he whose two envoys are Kisra and Tubbaʿ.

His scowl is terror to hearts, and his smile

a swift courier bearing glad news of what he bestows.

A friend whose help came to me when I had need

of him—not every friend is helpful.

He accepts my intercession for what is hard to obtain,

and smooths my way among men, then intercedes.

Rain passing by night, its abundance recounted when it comes forth,

and its pastures follow it when it ceases.

May calamities pass you by, Abu Isa; may there always be

compliant good fortune from time, coming to favor you.

I planted hope early in your shelter,

and most of a man's harvest comes from where he sows.

Other shares have jostled my share, and raised a clamor—

their visitants, some leaving the water, others entering to drink.

Yet extravagance did not waste my due, though there has always been

beside extravagance some due left neglected.

Had not a gift from you bound my resolve,

a gallant, noble man would have been in Abrujird;

and toward Iraq would have turned, hastening,

a gift-bearing caravan from Hamula, trotting swiftly.

As though the heaps of snow beneath their breasts

were Zarud's mountains, whose dunes they graze in spring.

Fine Egyptian linens, whose color the night struggles to change,

though a deeply saturated dye of night has tinged them.

As though the whiteness of the toothlike peak—the peak of Sumayra—

were a bank of cloud raised high and lifted into the sky.

Climbing toward the stars, late at night, from behind it,

are worn-out mounts, almost giving out from weariness.

As though the Pleiades were a swimmer struggling

against a current of water, rising and falling back.

Whenever, turning to one side, she calls

proudly to her al-ʿAyyuq, he comes rushing.

He tarries at dusk while she follows his light,

and she outstrips him as morning passes, so he follows.

As though Suhayl were the figure of a thirsty man bending

along the horizon, drinking from a pool on the ground.

When dawn and darkness are two opposing camps,

he rends from her cloak whatever is patched.

I am well, no longer afflicted with a complaint from love,

and I am sober, no longer yielding to desire or infatuation.

So pass those days of mine that rouse me

with their idle pleasures; indeed, to God I return.

Is it returning good sense, or the setting of youth

that has passed, with gray hair coming wholly in its place?

Yet the better of my two days is not the one when I curb youthful passion

for its sake, and am adorned with reason and granted enjoyment.