ألمم على طلل عفا متقادم — Uday Bin Al Rqaa

Visit an ancient campsite's time-effaced ruins,

between al-Dhu'ayb and Ghayb al-Na'im.

At the course through al-Kinas's sandy hollows, they have wrapped themselves,

since I left, in their strange, heaped-up dust.

to visit ash-heaps whose backs seem,

after years upon the earth, like the backs of doves.

So I remained downcast, as though my recollection

of what I recognized there were a dreamer's imagining.

Then I awoke and said, after persisting:

What can questioning a mute, silent thing bring back?

And sorrow lifted from me after

my eyelids choked with the streaming water of grief.

But for modesty, and the havoc wrought upon my head

by gray hair, I would have visited Umm al-Qasim.

And among women, it is as though she were lent

the eyes of a dark-eyed wild-cow calf of Jasim.

Drowsy, felled by sleepiness, so there hovered

a drowse in its eye, though it was not asleep.

Her speech ensnares the wakeful among men,

and her sweetness flies away with the sleeper's soul.

And when she smiles, a spaced row of teeth appears,

sweet, with which she startles the dreamer's heart.

And it is folly, after youth has gone,

for me to gaze at delicate women with dark, lustrous eyes.

They recoil from men's baldness and gray hair,

and love the disposition of every slender, unruly youth.

They turned away when the edge of my revelry was gone,

and forgot my fine character and my amulets.

So it is youth's caresses and its play

that come from them—not the tales of a bereft, learned man.

Sever what remains of your bond with them by riding she-camels,

narrow-eyed and gaunt, striding swiftly with their riders.

They drive them onward when they seek some purpose,

with plaited reins and nose-rings.

And when a landmark appears to them, as though it were

in the mirage, when it appears, a swimmer's forelock,

their chests swim toward it on forelegs

and padded feet with dark sinews, and hoof-tips.

And the ringing of the pebbles they strike seems,

on every broad upland, like the clink of dirhams.

They follow a swift she-camel, as though on her flank were

branding scars from the tightening of her two girth-straps.

If a stone pricks her, its sharp edge hurting

her foot-pad, or a snub-nosed biting fly troubles her,

she strikes her flanks with her padded foot, as though

a brawler's right hand struck in her defense.

And the men have bound their necks and beards

with the loose ends of their cloaks and turbans.

They endured night travel after the evening march, and reached morning

black-faced, bearing the ravages of scorching winds.

Indeed, I sought refuge in al-Walid—a man

who enriched me; whoever chooses him does not regret it.

In him are endless avenues for praise,

and noble deeds surpassing all noble deeds,

and the awe of a mighty king, and bounty

that exhausts the generous; you are the oppressor's scourge.

And when you gaze, turning the full front of your face

toward a man, he remains like one parched with thirst.

And when he pronounces decisive judgment, he is not swayed

by kinship, nor by a reproacher's blame.

Surpassing the abundant flood in favors are

the generous breezes of his days and public occasions.

A noble scion: when people see him, it is as though

they rejoice together at the approach of ceaseless rain.

He combines deep-rooted forbearance with nobility

so abundant that people live by it, and a resolute man's wisdom.

And when you love, your love brings benefit;

whoever you lock horns with does not escape you unharmed.

The giver of singing-girls like sculpted figures,

cloaked in the shadows of coal-black hair,

and of horses and conspicuous livestock; how often

he has given lavishly, without delay,

from among narrow-eyed camels with nose-rings in their nostrils,

and milk-laden females with tenderly nursing udders.