Sol 5.6

  1. Each day I bid farewell to someone beloved,

    and consign to the earth the body of one made a stranger.

  2. I turn away from him with seemly consolation,

    wiping sunset from his eyes,

  3. as though I did not know that this path

    is my path too, and that I shall meet Death;

  4. that behind me is a harsh driver pressing on,

    and before me a grievous day;

  5. or that, even if I survive a long while,

    I shall be stricken as another was stricken.

  6. Vain hopes—I squander myself in their delusion,

    finding the breeze of worldly vanity pleasant through them.

  7. Remember the final ends to which all plants return,

    and let not the eye pursue a luxuriant pasture.

  8. I have taken my seat upon calamities’ highway;

    Time passes over me in ordeal after ordeal.

  9. In anxious care I spend the prime of youth,

    and yield to Death beloved after beloved.

  10. I have feigned deafness to Death’s heralds

    when they call another, yet I cannot escape answering.

  11. And I know that I shall meet her—

    Death, who scattered our tribes and peoples.

  12. Indeed, my people have reached Death’s watering place;

    they went before me and answered the fearsome summoner.

  13. In whom shall I seek consolation while Death’s hands

    steal branch after branch from my family tree?

  14. The supporting quills of our wing have been plucked,

    leaving scars fixed upon every limb:

  15. stars whenever they attended councils,

    and missiles whenever they kindled the blaze of wars;

  16. whenever they pledged gifts to generosity,

    and whenever they shook the spear-sockets for combat.

  17. Lofty chiefs: they uttered no obscenity,

    nor kept any shameful speech in memory.

  18. The young man among them exerted his utmost;

    when he spoke, he spoke eloquently—a skilled orator.

  19. Outer robes that concealed no foul deeds,

    and inner garments that enclosed no faults;

  20. a face whose beauty inspired awe,

    so that you might take it for anger or a frown.

  21. Since your loss, my camels have groaned with yearning,

    and every pasture has revealed its barrenness to them.

  22. I drew away their reins so they might rest,

    and spared their humps and flanks.

  23. For whom should I seek wealth after you,

    wearing out the stallion and exhausting the led remount?

  24. Guardians of mountains whom Death has shepherded away,

    leveling with them both the earth and mountain heights.

  25. How many a radiant man among you, like the crescent,

    over whom two hands have heaped the mound of earth;

  26. and Death wrested from me, from his very person,

    a keen spearhead and a fearsome sword,

  27. sober forbearance and proud protective zeal,

    bold resolve and sound, unerring counsel.

  28. Swords I have buried in the dust,

    after blunting their finest edges and projecting points.

  29. I say to a caravan traveling light with waterskins,

    whose radiant beauty has now been exchanged for pallor:

  30. Halt, you two, amid those graves;

    unsaddle the steeds and clip their forelocks in mourning.

  31. Halt, you two, and make every eye rain blood

    over them, and fill every heart with throbbing grief.

  32. Hamstring none but the hearts’ beloved—

    for such as these, people hamstring mature and aged she-camels.

  33. Though Time has shot me with its arrows

    and left within my heart a gaping wound,

  34. the grinding teeth of calamity will find in me

    a steadfast heart and a solid, unyielding frame.

  35. I shall leave the gnashing fangs a remnant of my spear—

    a rugged shaft able to withstand their bite.

  36. O friends, may the massed storm cloud never cease,

    hoarse with thunder and driven by the south wind;

  37. when its mounts traverse the wide wilderness,

    secure upon them from footsoreness and fatigue,

  38. bursting its waterskins over your soil,

    and milking a brimming bucket over every grave.

  39. And I ask: Where shall the rain cloud pour—

    eastward when it sets forth, or westward?

  40. I begrudge the rain its pouring

    anywhere but upon your graves, wherever else it may fall.

  41. You have been wrested from us—alas, what a ruinous bargain!

    Through it, in life, I was cheated of a tender bough.

  42. Were it not for modest restraint, hearts would have encamped

    around you in bands, their collars torn.

  43. No measure could equal the calamity of losing you—

    no terror-stricken heart, no copiously streaming tears.

  44. Indeed, your graves in the open ground

    clothe the earth’s barren soil in beauty.

  45. We have surrendered our cheeks to the flood of tears,

    and our hearts, for you, to the burning of grief.

  46. Visions of you have so absorbed me

    that sorrow keeps me from composing love’s prelude.

  47. I once used to count the offenses of Time;

    since losing you, I count no other offense.

  48. Death, striving against you, awakened doubt in me,

    then increased until it passed beyond all mere doubting.

  49. Can I seek out one whom Death has removed from among the living?

    A futile quest, by your life, that would baffle even a physician.

Sol 5.6