1. Spare me the sweet-voiced, clever young gazelle,

    Who went round with cups of his glances and of wine,

  2. Drunk on beauty's proud conceit, with drowsy

    Eyelids, languid even when he does not doze.

  3. I have no desire left, nor any pleasure

    In a slender-flanked one with dusky, dark-tinted lips.

  4. This is no station for a helpless old man,

    Where they point at him: 'Reset the rope! Reset the rope!'

  5. And away from me with wine and its drinking,

    Unmixed, to the eloquent yet voiceless string.

  6. From Saydnaya came Butrus with it—

    The vintner; it was a captive taken from Jirjis.

  7. Far from it! He refuses drink whose heart holds

    The turmoil of obsessive worry over his dependents.

  8. I have little children like sandgrouse chicks;

    If I leave them, they have no companion.

  9. God is my support; theirs is the presence of al-Ashraf,

    The king of whose bounty I have not despaired.

  10. My only pleasure is praising al-Ashraf,

    The sovereign of abundant bounty, fierce Musa.

  11. Through him, meanings, noble attainments, and rhymes

    Have been clothed, in this age, in the noblest garb.

  12. It is as though they strut in heavy brocade,

    Or rich figured cloth, or garments of fine silk.

  13. And his army seems the Milky Way, resembling

    A river cleaving a garden of narcissi.

  14. And he is like a full moon shining amid auspicious stars,

    Whose radiance has defeated that of ill-omened stars.

  15. A king whose swords, on the day of battle, come between

    The bodies of his foes and their heads.

  16. How many an opponent's head he cleft with his blade,

    Together with his mail, his face-guard, and his helmet's crown!

  17. It had been odd before; he left it even:

    The sword is a drawing compass in an engineer's hand.

  18. His gifts among mankind are both general and particular,

    And multiplied upon his foes, by Euclid's reckoning.

  19. He assails with a severing blow—nay, a decisive one—

    With deep-piercing thrusts and shots that strike the mark.

  20. The battle-dust is night in daylight; its likeness is

    Blue spearheads amid pitch-black gloom.

  21. A king who, when kings assemble in a council,

    On the day of boasting, takes the foremost seat.

  22. And all the crowns of kings would wish

    To kiss the place of his beaver-fur headdress.

  23. And in the army he is like a lion going into

    Thickets of spears, clad in ample coats of mail.

  24. We feared evil eyes for him; they were warded off

    From his glory by al-Majd, the minister al-Bahnasi.

  25. And he is the son of one who put Hatim of Tayy to shame

    In generosity, and was like Bayhas in vendettas.

  26. Is it chivalry for a wealthy man to harry

    With his violence a penniless man with dependents?

  27. My gift came as dawn, though it had been sunset,

    Yet neither of the two was held back in his palace.

  28. So kindness became bitter to me, and turned

    Like a rose whose fragrance was mixed with sneezing powder,

  29. Until, whenever someone took a sniff of it,

    The sneeze almost shattered the bone of his nose.

  30. Alas for our deceitful world! For it is,

    I swear, more faithless to humankind than a harlot:

  31. Treacherous to the fierce lion, and then

    To the gray, loping wolf, and the stealthy thief.

  32. And toward King al-Ashraf, son of al-Adil

    Al-Mansur, I crossed wildernesses on a sturdy she-camel,

  33. Headlong, swift-striding, fleet and nimble,

    Crushing hillocks with her rapid stride through the wasteland.

  34. I made for Musa's fire, seeking a firebrand,

    And that is a fire whose like no one has ever borrowed.

  35. How many a white hand, with no blemish upon it,

    Has smiled upon Musa, while he did not frown!

  36. A radiant full moon, and full moons are his gifts,

    At the pinnacle of ancient, unyielding glory.

  37. Ask Khilat about him, that morning when they turned tiger-fierce—

    Its rebels, with brutality and arrogance.

  38. A king who hurled his troops against its towers,

    And they fell on their chins like a stumbling night-wanderer.

  39. They split the staff of unity and played Pharaohs; then came to them

    Musa, who then destroyed every evildoing Pharaoh.

  40. They raced on—alas for them!—in their error,

    And their feet stumbled over heads.

  41. So Khilat's conquest shook the lands, as far as

    Mardin, and on to the isles of Cyprus.

  42. A sovereign who sent their heads flying with his sword,

    In a fortress unprotected against his might,

  43. Until the edifice of a firm kingdom stood secure,

    Founded on conquest and manifest victory.

  44. So the sons of Abu Bakr are kings of Syria and the world,

    All of it, and of Jerusalem.

  45. For they are the kings; there are no kings besides them.

    Sweet are their harvests, for good is their planting-ground.

  46. A king whose sons, when they boast of him

    Among kings, leave every one of those kings speechless.

  47. May their kingdom remain theirs as long as

    The celestial spheres turn within the encompassing, starless sphere.

Sol 6.1