Sol 5.6

  1. O Egypt, how richly the life of that generation is filled—

    a generation that goes on as guidance for generations yet to come.

  2. Go forward, and bring glad tidings to calamities; for truly

    those calamities are the noble steeds of hope.

  3. What virtues of Ahmad have you mustered

    amid this calamity, with all the bewildering shock it holds?

  4. Those virtues fall short of every true account

    of them; when described, they lie beyond imagination.

  5. No reed pen can set them out in full;

    perhaps, told in sum, they will suffice.

  6. And foremost I record that self-sacrifice which

    is the sign of benevolence and gracious generosity.

  7. Ahmad’s death was no natural death; indeed it was

    the fiercest combat with death in its final outcome.

  8. He answered his conscience’s call when

    honor’s summons sounded—and what a field he ranged!

  9. Fever sought to hinder him, but he would not be turned by it;

    has fever ever barred the lion from its charge?

  10. O best of those who defended the cause, becoming for every

    defender who followed your example the noblest model.

  11. You surpassed self-sacrifice when medicine forbade you—or

    when ruin loomed—yet you paid it not the slightest heed.

  12. And you replied: “I have not begrudged the homeland

    my young blood—for surely no blood is too dear.”

  13. The lion cares nothing for dying once

    it has made the lair secure by the lion’s fall.

  14. Nor does the star whose light guides

    mankind mind pouring itself out in blazing flame.

  15. Nothing alarmed your heart among those lofty young eagles

    except noble men exposed to exemplary punishment.

  16. They stood in a graveyard of deaths upon mere suspicion,

    while life itself stood hostage to answer and interrogation.

  17. So you set yourself to clearing minds, with certainty,

    of every doubt secretly sown by rumor’s tongue.

  18. The enemy saw the truth, radiant, with no

    falsehood in it, and the fault-finders’ bewilderment was complete.

  19. You cried, “O Justice!” for a country whose

    dearest sons had come to be in chains.

  20. Then the stainless judiciary answered your appeal

    with a judgment free of error and dereliction.

  21. It feared none but its Lord in its judgment,

    spurned the informers’ fetter, and said:

  22. “Return those imprisoned without guilt to

    the families and children they left behind.

  23. Their feet indeed have been caught by their shackles,

    but no shackle ever reached their souls.”

  24. Through the noble service you rendered in rescuing them,

    the eyes of their people and kin were gladdened.

  25. You restored them to life, and you died: that is self-sacrifice—

    a gift surpassing every gift.

  26. Thus the seal with which you closed your life remained fixed,

    leaving in its wake an afterglow of wondrous beauty.

  27. If the people do not fully repay the thanks they owe you, may

    its choicest reward be yours from your Lord Most High.

Sol 5.6