إذا جزتما بالعيس دورة آبل — Alshaghouri

If you two ride pale camels around Abil,

and their forefeet trample the dust of the middens,

cast a glance to the left of the caravan,

toward Barada and the meadows with their leafy groves.

There, for you two, is a river beside which the Nile seems,

when it floods in Egypt, like one of the rivulets.

The fresh water lilies in it seem like stars

risen in the water's sky, never setting.

The water birds in it seem like brides

unveiled upon its bank in green robes.

When they drink from it, you become certain that they

are feeding chicks whose crops are downy.

And how many a fish in it wears breastplates

fashioned of raw gold, though its vital parts lie exposed.

Wounded by the edges of smooth rock, its murmur

is its groaning at the touch of those boulders.

When the river faces the darkness with its stars,

it shows us torchlight in the water's depths.

It threads the valley and comes upon a worthy mate,

a pampered beauty, by no means unadorned.

Then it embraces her until she turns in haste,

opening a pregnant belly upon the rock's back.

Thus it makes the spring of al-Fijah bear the rivers that

set Damascus amid seas and shores.

Behold, in the valley are gazelles whose eyelids

have a natural darkness that shames the kohl in its pots.

And turn aside, you two, to the spacious tract, for it

stirs in its beholder the lingering pangs of longing.

And on the slope below Sanir's heights are dwellings

in which I lived in bliss—ah, what dwellings!

Delightful nights passed for me in Madaya;

I reaped contentment from them by angering my reproacher.

Your nights, O Buqqin, remained within my breast,

a love coursing like my blood through my joints.

And in al-Zabadani, the cream of life was brought to me

by pure milk from the pure yield of brimming udders.

And the abode of joy in Kafr Amir still

appears thriving in every quarter, with sweet watering places.

And how often in al-Kubra I won the greatest of wishes from

time, and the smallest of them, amid those gatherings.

And in Ayn Hur are wide-eyed houris, deadly in their

glances, eloquent in speech, their anklets silent.

And in al-Dullah, wondrous beauty is encamped;

its mark there gives compelling evidence.

And Dayr Qubays is a paradise—what a paradise!

Its drinks are accompanied by food.

And visit lofty Bludan, you two, to gain

a pleasant life whose dwelling is not barren.

I yearn for Dummar's predawn shade,

and long for the deep shade at Abil.

And oh, how lovely is that al-Judayyidah, whose

meadows abound in watering places.

Meadows where spring has laid down its camel-neck,

swearing there that it will not depart from them.