Sol 6.1

  1. Have you not seen that folly's falsehood has ceased,

    and become a dark cloud whose signs now stand revealed?

  2. Is it love's madness, or the bird of parting, that has wasted me,

    at Jumd al-Safa, with its cawing and its hopping?

  3. Perhaps you grieve at recognizing a dwelling,

    its sites weatherworn in the valley of al-Qaryatayn.

  4. For I, though the reproaching women blame me, am enamored

    of the ghada trees, for love of one who never leaves them.

  5. And I have loved Dhu Marakh for love of its people,

    and where its watercourses end in al-Rawdatayn.

  6. Do you forget through the long lapse of time, or do you remember

    your beloved, a giver of affection, noble in his ways?

  7. How dear is a fire kindled between Muhlib

    and Fardah, if only the one who joins the bond would draw near!

  8. At times yearning would cling to me,

    when the departing steed had its straps drawn back.

  9. But when the two clans met, the staff was laid down,

    and love died when its vital spots were struck.

  10. Long have I concealed my love from Umamah;

    now is the time for love's signs to appear.

  11. When she is adorned, her jewelry rests upon a setting

    most lovely; otherwise, its bare places do not mar her.

  12. The women who used to reproach me over her said,

    'Perhaps love will kill him on the day of al-Mughayzil.'

  13. They said, 'Take your ease; do not be your own undoing,

    and do not preoccupy your heart'—though they themselves preoccupy it.

  14. And a day like a sandgrouse's toe, its youthful pleasures made lovely

    to me, its vain delights overpowering me—

  15. I dallied with a spirit adorned with necklaces,

    human in appearance, delightful in disposition.

  16. No pale gazelle-mother bending tenderly toward a fawn,

    like a girl's necklace, its joints not yet firm,

  17. was lovelier than she when she asked, 'Will you defer

    some favor until night, or would you hasten it?'

  18. If this love were merely love, I would have forgotten it;

    but it is a sickness whose relapses return.

  19. Nor have I forgotten a day at al-Aqiq: splendid was

    its morning, and sweet were its late hours at dusk.

  20. We were granted plentiful quarry there, and I was not

    like one whose arrows and snares go unrewarded.

  21. With graceful necks bent, they bade farewell to whoever had sobered,

    and whoever was kept from seeking pleasure by his sorrow.

  22. Far, far away are al-Aqiq and those there,

    and far away a union at al-Aqiq that you might renew.

  23. We have a need: look behind you—do you see

    at Rawd al-Qata the clan whose camel herd was brought home at dusk?

  24. The spurs of Aja, like great camels, lie between us and them,

    and sand, its dunes and thickets creeping along.

  25. We sent the messenger back to Sha'tha; I see nothing

    like that day, whose messages were returned.

  26. Had you been with me on the day of Qaww, you would have excused me

    for a day whose spirits and delusions swept me away.

  27. They say, 'When your debt with us falls due—

    and the best repayment of a debt is prompt—

  28. may you prosper! We shall repay you only with deferred payment

    of the debt, or goods in kind; will you accept that?'

  29. Is it from remembering Layla and the deserted traces

    on the slope of al-Munaqqa that the heart's madness has returned?

  30. On the evening we traded wisdom for folly, and were carried away

    by youth's exuberance and its reckless ways.

  31. That was a day whose good fell short of its evil;

    its talebearer was absent, and its reproacher desisted.

  32. And a wide, winding waste of desert, whose waterholes

    lay so far away that they appeared only after five days,

  33. I crossed on a noble she-camel, courageous of heart,

    lively whenever the girth's loose end was tucked away.

  34. She had hurried from a halting place where she left

    a dark mass of night, its dense shadows still unparted,

  35. and the frame of a weakened man whose bones were like

    rakhama roots, his joints not made firm.

  36. Her two sole-pads bleed upon every lava field,

    when she encounters a hard stretch and shifts her feet across it.

  37. We made our mounts kneel and praised God; the night journey grew bright

    with rosy crests, its flanks streaked white.

  38. I set my face toward the scorching wind, with between us

    scraps of Ardi cloth, its tatters flying.

  39. We have camels that sought protection from none but their people

    and stout spears whose upper shafts are brandished.

  40. They grazed where damran grows, from Sabal al-Mi'i

    to the ridge of A'yar, where wild asses bray.

  41. The Pleiades watered them with steady rain, drawing with it

    buckets from a Simak-cloud whose downpour streamed.

  42. You see low cloud beneath its two piled cloudbanks, as though it were

    ostriches going out at dawn, the fleeing ones shaking their down.

  43. They watch the oryx mothers, and what startles them is

    the dew-fly's chirping and its neighing.

  44. When people undertook affairs and feared

    an affair's upheavals, those upheavals did not frighten them.

  45. Amr and Hanzalah open the protected pasture to them,

    and al-Fizr's mainstay and backbone shield them.

  46. O Banu Malik, who was a refuge for the clan

    when the distressed man looked for his strongholds?

  47. At Dhu Najab we drove them back, while Malik failed

    a brother who never failed him amid the thrusting spears.

  48. Banu Jawkha blow upon their porridge, while our horses

    splinter the heights of rugged ground as they bound across it.

  49. We stayed between al-Sharabbah and al-Mala,

    where Ibn Dhi al-Jaddayn's chains sang among us.

  50. We brought death upon Bishr and his company at morning,

    unmixed; its torrent rained upon the two sons of Hujaymah.

  51. Will you not ask the people who slakes the spears,

    and whose hosts defend the dreaded frontier?

  52. Ours is every ardent youth, by whose hand are slaked

    the two wings of a Daylamite spearhead and its upper shaft.

  53. He moves swiftly with two trailing lengths: the skirt of flowing mail,

    and the length of a sword-belt whose straps have not been cut.

  54. My uncle led the dark host on the day of Quraqir,

    so his quarter-share and his extra spoils were ours.

  55. We had a continuing tribute imposed upon them,

    and the plunder of the tyrant among kings, and his camel herd.

  56. Do you lampoon Yarbu' while I leave Darim alone?

    The top of your pit has crumbled, and its depths.

  57. And with a dark host, like night's wing, we visited the enemy,

    its dust rising from what its squadrons stir up.

  58. When they send their horses forth, the land cannot shelter from them

    a solitary man, nor can strongholds protect a well-defended one.

  59. We guard the protected pasture, our horses charging with us,

    as falcons strike on a day of drizzle.

  60. Were you deceived because the name al-Farazdaq was once spoken?

    An aged beast can be gelded after its fang has erupted.

  61. For you have raced no straining pretender,

    nor one whose leg-sinews are cramped on the day of the wager.

  62. I am the full moon, dazzling your eyes' sight; try to reach

    with your two hands, son of the smith—can you attain it?

  63. I have donned my armor, while al-Farazdaq is a plaything,

    wearing a hobby-horse's two sashes and its bells.

  64. Ready saffron perfume with the ornaments, for

    Jarir is your husband, and you are his wives.

  65. And give as a mature woman gave to her husband,

    submitting to husband after husband, sending him messages.

  66. I am Time, which annihilates death, while Time is everlasting;

    so bring me something like Time to rival it.

  67. Was it from foolishness of mind that they brought their monkey

    to me? No monkey can contend with a noble camel-stallion.

  68. A sea's surging waves engulfed him and smothered him,

    and cast him into the whale's mouth—the whale devours him.

  69. If, son of the smith, you seek our glory,

    then seek Hadan, and see when you can reach it.

  70. Al-Khatafa built until we were pleased with his building;

    will you kill the smith if he fails to please you?

  71. We built a structure whose heights you never reached;

    the foundations of what you built brought down its summit.

  72. You have no power to recall the runaway verses, once

    they have raced ahead, as the sword outruns its reproacher's words.

  73. You will meet my sword-edge, a circling specter long dreaded,

    whose apparitions cut through the folds of backs.

  74. The smiths have never assailed a house with their own,

    nor can the smith move his house from the abode of humiliation.

  75. It was not we who granted Usaydah her judgment

    over a captive whose chains were clamped in iron.

  76. Nor were we the slaughtered army on the day of Uwarah,

    nor did Amir and his squadrons overrun us.

  77. You came to know Banu Abs on the evening of Aqrun,

    and the banner and its bearer were left to the army.

  78. And Imran on the day of al-Aqra'ayn was as though

    he had made his camel kneel beside one with two earrings and silent anklets.

  79. No carrying-strap remained on al-Farazdaq's sword,

    while Dhakwan ibn Amr's sword retained its carrying-straps.

  80. He suckles from whoever he meets; even if he meets a cripple

    leading a blind man, al-Farazdaq begs from him.

  81. When he takes off his shirt, Mujashi' says,

    'He has the shoulders and withers of a donkey's trough.'

  82. At Hafar al-Sidan you encountered disgrace,

    and on the day of al-Raha no washer cleansed your garment.

  83. O Harith, take whomever you wish from us and from them,

    and let us measure glory whose excellences can be counted.

  84. In God's Book, the demolition of our house is not

    like the demolition of a brothel whose entrances are foul.

  85. In one chamber of it are al-Nawar and his drinking companions,

    and in another chamber are his bellows and his cauldrons.

  86. The tavern-drinkers make him sway as he goes at evening,

    when his fingers set a harp's strings vibrating.

  87. You have neither resistance nor noble roots,

    and whatever oppression you are given, you accept it.

  88. In panic you turned to a female harpist from Herat,

    at a time when his frivolity cannot confront earnestness.

  89. When they polished a sword, we struck with its blade,

    and its scabbard and carrying-straps returned to us.

Sol 6.1