ألم خيال هاج من حاجة وقرا — Jarir

A phantom visited, stirred by longing, and lingered.

Peace be upon you—why this visit to the travelers?

In a trackless waste whose water lies deep, its guide at dusk

complains, from terror, of deafness in his ears.

There you see the five-day watering trek, its camel train stretched long,

when the men stray, as though being killed in captivity.

On them you cleave the heart of every empty waste,

as though the mounts, bearing us, were shunning embers.

Night travel folded them like eyelids, and they were drawn in

by leanness, until you could not secure a braided girth on them.

When they crossed the desert beyond Dhu Jarawil, they rose to the uplands

from the lowlands and clambered over its dust-gray, rugged hills.

It was not just a month's journey that our riding camels were charged with,

but a month they joined to another month.

Lean mounts tread the open stretches toward you

of sand, until their riders waded through the sea.

When we rouse them in the desert, it is as though

we rouse red-shanked, scant-feathered ostriches on the fifth-day watering morning.

They sought Ibn Layla in hope of his bounty;

and were it not for Ibn Layla, they would not have brought us to Egypt.

You were praised, and we received glad news of your abundant generosity,

and it was like something of which we already had full knowledge.

Whenever those seeking bounty make their camels kneel at your door,

with the delegation, their bags never return empty.

And they told us, 'Make for Abd al-Aziz!

There you find sound judgment and overflowing bounty.'

The finest of mothers raised you high, and met

a full-moon night whose appointed time was decreed.

So she brought forth a light whose face gives radiance;

his lineage is lofty—and who can deny the dawn?

And a well-born, fair woman from her people's own stock—

you made the swaying spears her bridal gift,

when the black horses, from spearhead blows before her,

were taken for bays or chestnut Humayli horses.

A need drove us to you; we found for it

no recourse beyond you, nor any stopping short of you.

Relieve me and my companions with a she-camel that guarantees hospitality,

as though a great pitch-coated vessel hung at her flanks.

Whenever she sniffs the blossoms of every garden

with a sweet fragrance, her lips turn yellow.

Yours is the highest branch of Quraysh's two clans; you have lost

neither star nor full moon when noble deeds are counted.

You reached the summit of the two Asbaghs' house, and found no

edifice surpassing the two Asbaghs or Amr.

Marwan chose them from a house of high standing,

and was their peer, and their kinsman by marriage.

For indeed Tamim—know this well—is your brother,

and among the most grateful of those you have granted well-being.

Whenever you wish, you rouse Tamim, and so rouse

lions of battle that crush your enemies utterly.

We lead the fine, carefully tended steeds despite sore hooves

against your enemies, until we have annihilated them by force.