أجد اليوم جيرتك ارتحالا — Jarir

Today your neighbors have resolved to depart,

and you have no wish for parting at Dhu al-ʿUshr.

Stop, you two; turn aside to the old camp-traces at Rahba,

then greet their traces, even if they have changed.

And I likened the camel-litters, that morning at Qaww,

to Indian ships setting out at evening from Awal.

They set their course to the right of Shatib,

and to the left of the rocky uplands of Dhu Baqar.

They mingled for us enticing promises

with stinginess that denied your wish, and excuses.

Charming women who had never lived a life of hardship

renew their promises and their delays.

For they have consumed your life, day after day,

with a promise for which they gave no return.

And had they desired that, they would have given you sweet water,

despite the hindrances, now and then, crystal-clear.

But the guardians barred you from it,

so, despite your thirst, you are given not a drop.

Will you not requite my love through nights

and long days I bound together with that love?

I love those who departed that morning at Qaww,

and I do not love the dwellers encamped there.

Indeed your tears streamed the day they brought back

the camels for the tribe's departure, then loaded them.

And among the departing litters were women like the oryx of Rumah;

they set traps and snares for him.

They did not miss the vital mark when they shot at my heart

with arrows whose shafts they had not feathered,

but with eyes and every cheek

you fancy burnished for its radiant beauty.

By your life, nearness to Hind brings you nothing—

when you visit her—but madness.

And the tale-bearers spoke, alarming us

with some words we hate to hear uttered.

I saw you, O Ukhaytil, when we raced,

and, when horsemanship was tested, you proved inept.

And al-Farazdaq was goaded after much effort,

so he threw down his bow when he tired of the archery contest.

And we are the superior ones; on what day

can you say the Taghlibi hoped for preeminence?

Have you not seen that Banu Tamim's glory

was built by God the day He built the mountains?

He built for them firmly rooted, towering mountains,

and God raised its summit, so it stood tall.

Every bright-faced Khindifi built up my glory,

vying with the north wind within his pavilion.

All creation serves him while he stands exalted,

and by evening all people are his dependents.

The mighty chiefs bowed before a Khindifi

who, when we wish, bristles with rage, then charges.

And the Taghlibi hastens whenever we make our levy,

with his tribute, awaiting the crescent moon.

You met Qays's cavalry in al-Jazira,

so you said, 'Mar Sergius! No fighting!'

No cavalry of yours stood firm against cavalry,

nor were your men of any use to men.

And you abandoned Shuʿayth of Banu Mulayl;

the sword struck his shoulder, so he slumped.

You drank wine after Abu Ghuwayth;

so may your drunken bouts bring you no peace of mind!

The Taghlibi woman, drunk, sniffs

the pig's nape, thinking it a gazelle.

The wine keeps making her two neck-veins twitch,

and she complains of numbness in her legs.

Do you think your mother's copper coin was glory,

and your shearing thick wool from the short-legged sheep?

Reach for what you found your father building;

but as for the Khindifi, you will never attain him.

Is al-Ukhaytil's father not a Taghlibi?

So wretched is a Taghlibi as father and maternal uncle!

If your maternal uncle happens to be a Taghlibi,

then exchange him, if you find a replacement for him.

And Yarbuʿ dwells on the summits of the hills,

and builds tall pillars above them.

And al-Ukhaytil has clung to a rope of misfortune;

so their day weighed heavily on him and dragged on.

Have you not seen, O Ukhaytil, the war of Qays

turn bitter when you seek a second draught of it?

If your drunken stupor will not lift, then taste

the swords of India and the thirsty spears.