1. حتّامَ ذمّي عندكمْ أزماني

    وبحبّكمْ طرق الزّمانُ جَناني

    How long shall I reproach my times before you?

    And through love for you, Time has struck my heart.

  2. تاللَّه ما أنصفتُمُ في حبّكمْ

    فَرداً وأنتمْ والغرامُ اِثنانِ

    By God, in love for you, you have not dealt fairly

    With one man alone, while you and passion are two.

  3. لو أنّ هذا الحبَّ يظهر شخصُهُ

    لدخلتُ في أحشائه بسِنانِ

    If the bodily form of this love were to appear,

    I would thrust into its entrails with a spearhead.

  4. لَكنّه يرمي القلوبَ ويتّقِي

    بسوادِها من أسهمِ الشُّجعانِ

    But it shoots at hearts and shields itself

    With their dark cores against the arrows of the brave.

  5. يا ليتَ شعري كيف يثأر عاشقٌ

    وعدوُّه في موطنِ الأخدانِ

    Would that I knew how a lover can take vengeance

    When his enemy dwells among his intimate friends.

  6. يا من يغير على المحبّ بقلبهِ

    ألّا اِنفردتَ له من الأعوانِ

    O you who attack the lover with his own heart,

    Why not face him alone, without your helpers?

  7. لَو كانَ ذاك لما اِنفردتَ بطائلٍ

    ولعُدْتَ تسحب بُردةَ الحِرْمانِ

    If that were so, you would gain nothing,

    And would return dragging the cloak of deprivation.

  8. وَأَنا الّذي راع اللّيالي بأسُهُ

    فشعارُها من أسترِ الألوانِ

    And I am he whose might has frightened the nights,

    So their garb takes the most concealing of colors.

  9. يَلقى الرّدى بعزيمةٍ هو عندها

    وَالعيشُ إلّا في الذُّرا سِيّانِ

    I face death with a resolve to which death

    And life—unless upon the heights—are alike.

  10. سَلْ عنِّيَ الأبطالَ إذْ عمّمتُهم

    بقواضبي بدلاً من التّيجانِ

    Ask the champions about me, when I turbaned them

    With my keen swords instead of crowns.

  11. تُخبِرْكَ عن نَصْلِ الفَراشِ رؤوسُهمْ

    وَنُحورُهم تُنبيك عن خُرصاني

    Their heads will tell you of skull-bones stripped away,

    And their throats will tell you of my spears.

  12. لا تَأمنُ الأعداءُ منِّي نَجدَةً

    ظَفَري بهمْ يلقاهُمُ بأماني

    My enemies find no safety from my valor;

    My triumph over them greets them with my assurance of safety.

  13. يا عاذلِي في بذلِ نفسي للوغى

    أنتَ الكفيلُ بعيشِ كلِّ جبانِ

    O you who chide me for offering my life to battle,

    Are you the guarantor of every coward's survival?

  14. إنّ الرّدى دَيْنٌ عليك قضاؤه

    فاِسمحْ به في أشرفِ الأوطانِ

    Death is a debt you are bound to pay,

    So yield it freely in the noblest of places.

  15. مَن فات أسبابَ الرّدى يوم الوغى

    لَحِقَتْهُ في أمْنٍ يدُ الحَدَثانِ

    Whoever escapes the causes of death on battle day,

    The hand of calamity overtakes him even in safety.

  16. لو كان هذا الدّهرُ يُنصف ساعياً

    لوَطِئْتُ منه مطالعَ الدَّبَرانِ

    If this age dealt fairly with one who strives,

    In it, I would have set foot where Aldebaran rises.

  17. لا تأمُلَنْ زمناً يؤلّف وِردُهُ

    بين الأسودِ الشُّوسِ والسِّرْحانِ

    Never pin hope on an age whose watering place unites

    Fierce lions and the wolf.

  18. يُعطِي بَنيهِ العيشَ لا عن صَبْوَةٍ

    ويشلُّهُم عنه بلا شَنَآنِ

    It gives its sons life, not out of affection,

    And drives them away from it without hatred.

  19. فمتى رأيت مجرّراً أذيالَه

    ناديته يا صاحبَ الأكفانِ

    So whenever I see it dragging its hems,

    I call to it: 'O master of shrouds!'

  20. عندي له صبرٌ يردّدُ رِيقه

    في صدره وقذاه في الأجفانِ

    I have patience for it that sends its spittle back

    Into its breast, and its grit into its eyelids.

  21. ولَطالما جرّعته كأسَ الأسى

    وجَدَحْتُها بأسنّةِ المُرّانِ

    And how often I have made it gulp the cup of sorrow,

    And stirred it with the spearheads of ashwood lances.

  22. كن يا زماني كيف شئتَ فلن ترى

    شخصَ المذلّةِ لائذاً بلُباني

    Be as you will, O my time: you shall never see

    The figure of humiliation taking refuge in my breast.

  23. ما كلُّ مَن تلقى يبيعك عقلَه

    ولَبَيْعُهُ من أكبر الخُسْرانِ

    Not everyone you meet will sell you his reason;

    And selling it is indeed among the greatest losses.

  24. ألقيتُ عن قلبي السُّرورَ لفارغٍ

    من همّتي بغرورِه ملآنِ

    I cast joy out of my heart, leaving it to one empty

    Of my ambition, yet brimming with its delusion.

  25. ما عاقني سِرْبُ السُّرورِ وإنّما

    كِبَرُ النّفوسِ شبيبةُ الأحزانِ

    The flock of joy has not hindered me; rather,

    Greatness of soul is the youthful vigor of sorrows.

  26. ومُبَرّأٍ من كلّ ما شمل الورى

    ألقيتُ من ثِقَتي إليه عِناني

    And to one untainted by all that has beset mankind,

    I cast my reins, out of trust in him.

  27. لمّا كساني حُلَّةً من وُدِّهِ

    أُنْسِيتُ سَلْبَ حَبائبي رَيْعاني

    When he clothed me in a robe of his affection,

    I was made to forget my beloveds' theft of my youthful bloom.

  28. ما زلتُ أفحصُ في الورى عن مثلهِ

    حتّى ظفرتُ بمن أقول كفاني

    I kept searching among mankind for one like him,

    Until I found one of whom I say: 'He suffices me.'

  29. طمحتْ إليه عينُ كلِّ رئاسةٍ

    لولاه ما نظرتْ إلى إنسانِ

    The eye of every high office aspired to him;

    But for him, it would have looked upon no man.

  30. لو شاء ما فاتَتْه أبعدُ رُتْبَةٍ

    يسعى إليها الخلقُ بالأجفانِ

    Had he wished, no rank, however distant, would have eluded him,

    Toward which mankind strives on their very eyelids.

  31. لكنّه نظر الممالك دونه

    فَزَهى على السُّلطانِ مِن سلطانِ

    But he regarded kingdoms as beneath him,

    So, by his own power, he rose proudly above the ruler.

  32. سبق الكرامَ السّالفين إلى العُلا

    والسَّبْقُ للإحسانِ لا الأزمانِ

    He outstripped the noble men of old toward the heights;

    And precedence belongs to good deeds, not to earlier times.

  33. يا مَن علا بي ظهرَ وَرْدٍ سابقٍ

    لمّا رأى ذمّي إليه حِصاني

    O you who raised me onto the back of a swift bay horse,

    When he saw my complaint to him about my stallion:

  34. إيّاك أنْ تُفْشِي سَريرةَ وُدِّنا

    فيصدّني عن قربك المَلَوانِ

    Beware of revealing the secret of our affection,

    Lest day and night bar me from your nearness,

  35. ويمدّ صَرْفُ الدّهرِ نَحِوى طَرْفَه

    وَهو الّذي لَولاك ليس يراني

    And time's adversity cast its gaze toward me—

    Though without you it would not see me.

  36. هَذا الّذي ذكراه آنسَ ناظري

    وهواه أوحشني من الأشجانِ

    This is he whose remembrance gladdens my eye,

    And love for him has made me a stranger to sorrows.

  37. أُهدِي إليه من كلامي أيِّماً

    لكنْ لها من مدحِهِ بَعْلانِ

    I offer him, from my words, an unwed woman,

    Yet through praising him she has two husbands.

  38. تتجاذبُ الخُطّابُ دون جنائها

    ويُرَدُّ عنها أجملُ الفِتْيانِ

    Suitors vie with one another, short of plucking her fruit,

    And the handsomest of youths is turned away from her.

  39. فَتَوَدُّ كلُّ جوارحي في مدحهِ

    أنْ كنّ من شوقٍ إليه لساني

    So all my limbs wish, in praising him,

    That, from longing for him, they could be my tongue.