Sol 6.1

  1. We have reached, though fearing for our lives,

    The bank of al-Sarat, toward the land of Ibn Marwan.

  2. A flying boat that once served as al-Hajjaj's mount,

    You see it has helpers against the waves' harm.

  3. It brought us to lofty Kufa on the third night,

    From al-Ubulla, with the waves as they were.

  4. Indeed, I swore by hanging necks,

    Made to bear the chins of aged she-camels' heads,

  5. Sacrificial beasts driven to where their blood

    Soaks linen with clotted gore from their entrails.

  6. I shall surely praise you with praise that cannot be matched

    By any other praise—it stands high above them all.

  7. Our praise of Abu al-Ashbal shall surely reach

    Anyone in al-Ghawr or the two Marws of Khurasan.

  8. As though it were pure gold, embellished

    By the tongue of the man with earth's most poetic demon.

  9. A people who refused to let indecency touch their female neighbor,

    And who erect bulwarks against calamities,

  10. And strike the heads of their matched foes,

    When the coward sees death in many forms.

  11. They are the horsemen who protect the women when

    They come out running light-footed on the day of terror.

  12. And you are from a people whose defenders are shielded

    By blows that rend souls and bodies.

  13. Bajila, when its horsemen met their foes,

    And the people rose at dawn with the sword drawn bare,

  14. Guarded a sanctuary with spear-thrusts; none defended it

    But their spears, against men whose hour of death had come.

  15. The wisest—their minds never grew light,

    And the heaviest in the balance against their enemies.

  16. And swift to serve guests their meal when they alight,

    And best of all at protecting neighbors on the day of terror.

  17. The hands of Bajila are hands unmatched

    By spear-fighting hands when they meet their peers.

  18. A people of ancestral honor, vast in its bounty;

    They built still higher upon the structures of glory.

  19. Whoever strives, hoping to attain their achievements,

    Will find their summit and pillars barring the way.

  20. A people who, when their voices rise, rout

    Those acclaimed as champions among the cavalry.

  21. He gives noble gifts that cannot be matched

    By any giver; nor, after giving, does he taunt with favors.

  22. I have seen Abu al-Ashbal, with refuge sought

    In him by the mountains, like a raider near Khuffan.

  23. A guest at Ayn Abagh, who always has

    Meat—a hungry ravager of the people.

  24. He has barred the open ground; no one travels there by night,

    And has left no human in the darkness of the thicket.

  25. As for solitary men, not one can stand against him,

    And at times he charges against two thousand.

Sol 6.1