إِذا ماتَبَيَّنّا الأُمورَ تَكَشَّفَت

لَنا وَأَميرُ القَومِ لِلقَومِ خادِمُ

Whenever we discern affairs, they reveal themselves

to us—and the people's prince is the people's servant.

أَقَلُّ بَني الدُنِيا هُموماً وَحَسرَةً

فَقيدُ غِنىً لِلمالِ وَالرُشدِ عادِمُ

Least burdened, among the children of this world, by worry and regret

is one bereft of material self-sufficiency and devoid of sound judgment.

وَما هِيَ إِلّا مَنزِلٌ غَيرُ طائِلٍ

فَمُرتَحِلٌ عَنهُ وَآخَرُ قادِمُ

It is nothing but a dwelling that will not last:

one traveler departs from it, and another arrives.

تُبَكّي عَلى المَيتِ الجَديدِ لِأَنَّهُ

حَديثٌ وَيُنسى مَيتُكَ المُتَقادِمُ

You weep for the newly dead because he is

recent, while your dead of long ago is forgotten.

وَلَو أَنَّني وافَيتُها بِتَخَيُّرٍ

لَأَدمى البَنانَ العَشرَ بِالأَزمِ نادِمُ

Had I come to it by my own choosing,

I would, remorseful, have bloodied all ten fingertips by biting them.

سَيُسليكَ أَنَّ القابِضَ باسِطٌ

وَأَنَّ الَّذي شادَ البَنِيَّةَ هادِمُ

It will console you that the one who takes away also gives,

and that the one who raised the edifice is its destroyer.