كالروح والريحان ذكرك يعبق — Walid Al Azami

Like a refreshing breeze and sweet basil, your remembrance wafts fragrance.

So the world rejoices in it and applauds.

And the remembrance of Muhammad's spring delights it,

Where life is beautiful and adorns itself.

At dawn, the breath of its fragrance stirs,

Bursting forth like musk throughout its reaches.

And hills, their surfaces embroidered with fine silk,

Green and rippling, as though they were brocade.

And streams, their water like the water of springs,

Flow sweetly, rippling clear and smooth.

And the radiant chrysanthemum smiles with its mouth,

And jasmine is neatly arranged and ordered.

And a narcissus's eyes gaze toward him, as

A lover gazes toward the beloved and looks intently.

And a butterfly flies among the flowers,

Now disappearing among them, now shining forth.

It is a rose in its own time and place;

Beauty and splendor unite it with the roses.

So say to every obstinate person:

God creates wondrously whatever He wills, and brings it into being.

This is Muhammad's spring and its splendor;

All hearts fall deeply in love with its beauty.

And live through remembrance, renewing their covenant

With truth and the goodness that pours forth.

For life has changed and has become

Bewildered, nearly choking on civilization.

And lackeys regard Muhammad's religion as

Backwardness, and merchandise that will not sell.

May they be abased! No atheist has known the truth,

Dead of conscience, nor any cowardly fool.

Like a parrot, he repeats what he is told,

Ignorantly imitating others and embellishing.

Changing with circumstances: a believer

One day, and another day an unbeliever, a heretic.

His nature settles upon no fixed state;

And when, throughout life, has mercury ever stayed still?

They appeared before the world with the most shameful idea,

Hideous, rejected by reason and logic,

Destructive in its roots and branches.

It heals humankind with what it wills, and wears them down.

Thus, in its view, the free man is unbound

From everything connected with right guidance.

As for the honorable man, you have learned his condition

From them—and has a fool ever known dignity?

And peace, in the language of beasts, means massacres,

Where the blood of people of honor is spilled.

And over the heads of the innocent hang sickles,

And hammers fall, and a rope strangles.

And an orphan girl in her cradle swims in blood

Flowing toward her from her parents.

Wretched be the son of Adam if he strips himself of guidance,

For he is base, tyrannical, and enraged.

O young men of Islam, this is your day!

Come, embody the Prophet's moral character.

Close the ranks, and leave no breach unattended,

Through which a traitor and a sower of division slip.

And abandon others' principles; examine carefully

The corruption they contain, and investigate.

Your Quran, O Muslims—its radiance

Shines like the full moon in the heart of the sky.

Justice abounds in it; outside it

Are falsehood, slander, and all-encompassing injustice.

Lift the veil from your eyes, for false is

What one looking West or East claims.

This is God's call, so listen to it,

And draw near to Him, fear Him, and be mindful of Him.

O human being, you are toiling;

So turn to a path that treats your toil gently.

I see, outside Muhammad's path,

Neither truth nor justice in which I can place my trust.

It is shameful for me, as a Muslim, to accept

A path that departs from the Book and transgresses.

I am a Muslim; it is shameful and disgraceful for me,

Though I am honored, to fawn on an unbeliever,

Or to take up an idea every day,

For a donkey, rushing forth, to lead me in it.

On every horizon: an oppressor and massacres,

Whose terrors split rock apart.

And Muslims alone are the victims.

Let no shouter or applauder deceive you.

Oran—how often the enemy has savagely killed its people!

And mosques they demolished, and a house they burned.

And for Tunisia, France devised a plan:

Bizerte nearly drowned in its blood.

And Oman is crushed by the enemy's oppression;

How often it cries for aid, with no compassionate rescuer.

And on the hills of Kashmir, how many a turmoil,

Blind, harms Muslims and annihilates them.

And at the world's farthest end, in Jarwa, are brothers

Of yours; you have not joined them with a tenth of your striving.

And Jerusalem—I do not know: is anyone among us unaware

Of what the blue-eyed enemy has wrought there?

Even the Jews—what disgrace for a nation

That has come to fear the Jews and tremble.

It stretched out hands of shame to beg with them

For bread its enemies give it as charity.

It dwelt in tents of humiliation after its palaces.

Can any further humiliation come to pass?

Pardon us, Messenger of God, O our beacon,

For division has afflicted the Muslims.

Mutual strife and hatred crept among them,

So they neglected their religion and were torn apart.

And the paths of corruption branched out: one man

Mends their clothes, while a thousand tear them.

How strange! Does the man of virtue and guidance fall silent

While the man of corruption mouths obscenities?

A state that wrongs the Messenger and his religion,

That Badr rejects and the Trench refuses.

I, O Messenger of God, sing your name,

So the ears of time listen intently and bow.

And 'God is greatest' shakes them with a tremor;

On hearing it, the unbeliever falls and is thunderstruck.

I am one of Muhammad's young men and soldiers,

And without Muhammad's guidance I do not speak.

I have pledged to my Lord to keep striving in His cause,

And cling to no rope but God's.

I am a Muslim in my creed and in my path:

A covenant binding on me for life, and a solemn pledge,

Never to make a truce with an unbeliever or an oppressor—

A covenant, even if I am hanged for it.