Sol 5.6

  1. He sought release from love of Sulayma and of Hind,

    but wayward folly overpowered him, defeating sound judgment.

  2. Through procrastination he became estranged, shunning

    his sincere counselor amid error, yet obeying whoever leads him to ruin.

  3. Whenever the morning visitations of his cares came early,

    he poured red wine over them, red as roses.

  4. As though its evening radiance, when it is drunk,

    were Isa’s radiant face when he utters a promise.

  5. As though the “yes” in his mouth whenever he says it

    were a mouth-drop of musk, gleaming in melted honey.

  6. When he bestows, his laughter is as though it were

    the first glad gleams of lightning after it has long been unseen.

  7. I remembered days whose happiness has passed from me,

    when he preferred me, in jest and in earnest.

  8. I would assail Fate with an onslaught like that of his bounty

    upon supplicants’ want—through generous giving and aid.

  9. Then lies turned his heart from the good opinion he had of me—

    lies brought by an ignoble man, by a base wretch.

  10. He seized as an advantage against me my absence and his presence,

    and the fact that I had no means to repel him before he attained his aim.

  11. If some offense occurred, or some lapse has gone by,

    you stand too high for either my inadvertent error or my deliberate wrong.

  12. Whoever holds a guilty man in his two hands—

    his power makes the offense forgotten and sweeps rancor away.

  13. Thus my gratitude is my repentance, my apology my means of appeal,

    and whatever favor your two hands bestowed remains with me.

  14. Though my verse has come deliberately bearing an apology,

    my offense was neither deliberate nor intended.

Sol 5.6