1. Lo, Salma set out at dawn, and her departure was in earnest;

    And her leader split the staff after union.

  2. Whenever we said, 'Separation has grown wide,'

    Salma lets a tear quiver, or lets it flow.

  3. She has full, lush limbs that have choked

    Salma's solid anklets and her bracelets.

  4. Whenever we could not manage a visit to Salma,

    We begrudged Salma's favor to whoever visited her.

  5. Then will a sturdy-backed she-camel carry me to my goal,

    Slow to tire amid the swift white camels' rushing?

  6. A fleet one: flint rings beneath her sole,

    In an hour of clinging shadows, with scorching noonday heat.

  7. Ah, if only I knew of Salit—did they not find

    A neighbor other than Ghassan to shelter Salit?

  8. They entrusted their lineage-honor to a man of disgrace,

    Who whispers of it to a soul whose inner thoughts are vile.

  9. They will learn what help Hukaym and Manqa' can give

    When war's envoy fails to return with peace.

  10. Ah, how poorly Salit fights when swollen are

    Their breastplates, and their backs grow broader.

  11. Menial hangers-on roast camel hoof-pads in the forenoon,

    When the raiding parties' raider urges them to gallop.

  12. So Salit has no horseman with zeal for honor,

    And on battle's day their arses are their refuge.

  13. Make the water-camels groan under the waterskins, for you

    Will be spared the horses' charge, their throats bleeding.

  14. I marveled at the man summoning Juhaysh and Sa'id,

    While Aysa's levy hurries about with milking bowls.

  15. Is Aysa hurrying forth while the sheep are full-uddered?

    So what did Aysa seek, or what is her excuse?

  16. Whenever you boast of your arses' greatness, then honor

    Juhaysh when her caravan returns from summer.

  17. A people who take their coarse woollen cloak

    For a goat-down plush blanket, its woven border turned back.

  18. When one says, 'Riders from Salit,' may they be disgraced—

    Mounts and riders alike, their herald a base fellow.

  19. I forbade you to ride into a horn-butting kind

    Of war, whose warner flourishes a cloak.

  20. And you have no endurance against a Mashrafi sword

    That bites the skulls' fledglings or cleaves them.

  21. You wished to strip the plain of its people;

    So too did hopes, with their deceit, beguile Juhaysh.

  22. And there was water enough in Baq'a for your sheep,

    And Tal'a; and al-Jawba's pool flows.

  23. Restrain one another; do not come to drink at a Mashrafi sword,

    Whose 'male' blades send skull-sutures flying.

  24. The Salitis are like crumbled truffles,

    For the first gatherer who stirs them up with a stick.

  25. You grew angry over it, or sang of it,

    Because its fresh undergrowth greened in the ravines' beds.

  26. Had there been any useful forbearance in Muqallad,

    Their breasts would not have burned with anger without a wrong.

  27. The sons of al-Khatafa, and the horses in the days of Sufa,

    Cleared the darkness from you, and its light broke forth.

  28. And at Hisn's well, zeal for honor overtook them,

    And its dug-out earth had twice been put back into it.

  29. So we came when it had become pasture, and there had knelt

    Upon it pregnant she-camels, with no one to rouse them.

  30. If his judgment once went astray at al-Mujashshar,

    And he envied Awf, yet did them no harm,

  31. Then it is all the more fitting—more fitting still—that I strike Muqallad

    With an overwhelming contagion, swift in its spread.

  32. Their women were indeed stripped on the day of al-Hidab,

    So ugly were their exposed charms, and meager their bridal gifts.

Sol 6.1