Sol 6.1

  1. May we have all we wished for in life, as long as

    the loud-voiced doves at Nu'man call their cooing.

  2. To you, Commander of the Faithful, we were driven

    by anxious hopes and a wilderness crossed without guidance,

  3. and time's bite, O son of Marwan, which left nothing

    of wealth but what was utterly ruined or swept away;

  4. and a bare expanse of plains, where the least to be found is

    stripped ṣuhār, or bowls gathered together;

  5. and tawny camels with swaying shoulders, as though

    weariness had coated them with diluted saffron.

  6. We set out with them from the edge of Kuhaylah's sands,

    while they still had spirited vigor and headstrong pride.

  7. They kept going until their strides grew short,

    their humps wasted away, and their hoof-tips bled;

  8. until we had worn the wildness out of them, and they were left,

    whenever made to kneel, with tears pouring from their eyes;

  9. until the slow camel-driver walked along, driving them,

    their footpads bleeding and their backbones rubbed bare;

  10. until we roused them, with nothing binding any foreleg,

    once a worn rope was loosened from them—yet they shuffled as if bound.

  11. Whenever we halted, there fought to protect our backs

    lanky camels, crescent-like and gaunt.

  12. Whenever we showed them the reins, they came

    toward us, turning their smooth cheeks sidelong.

  13. They carried us across the whole breadth from Yabrin

    to al-Sham, with mountain spurs and level plains meeting us.

  14. So the Da'iriyyah camel's spirit was spent by her plunging

    through the night with us, while the wrapped-up sluggard slept,

  15. when the sky's horizons grew dust-dark, and there were laid bare

    the sides of the tribe's tents by a red, freezing gale;

  16. and every huge she-camel tore the tent ropes,

    each with a lofty, shaggy hump of solid fat.

Sol 6.1