نحن أرينا الباهلية ما شفت — Farazdaq

We showed the Bahili woman what soothed

her soul—a head hung up in vengeance.

We carried it to her from Mu‘awiya, who

is the mother brooding over every chirping chick.

And we removed from Khuwayla of Jahdar

a choking bone that had lodged in her throat.

Whenever Misma‘'s two sons were mentioned to her,

gushes of her glistening tears flowed.

So youth's mantle became welcome to her, though it had not

been welcome within her burning breast.

Eighty beards came to her, though they did not walk,

their skulls some severed and others split open.

How many bodies of theirs lie at Qandabil,

and at al-‘Aqr, how many heads and elbows are sent tumbling,

sent tumbling from the fortress where they hastened,

to the ground, scattered, from the slain and the overpowered!

For there is no feat of valor or loyalty save what

we did at Qandabil, when we climbed

toward them, while they were on its wall, with our swords

and quivering spears that pierced them through and through.

Then if killing in vengeance for Ibn Artat brings healing

and staunches an eye's glistening tears,

then our blows left nothing of al-Muhallab's house—

with every keen-edged, gleaming Yemeni blade—

for them but mourning bands, their women standing

beside naked bodies and little children,

and a wife whom our spears gave in marriage,

lawful to whoever consummates marriage with her, though she was not divorced.