أطيف سرى وهنا متيما — أبو المعالي الطالوي

Was it a phantom that journeyed by night, love-stricken in the dark?

Or the garden, made to weep by rain, and so it smiled?

Was it a breath from the Valley of Enchantment, borne by the east wind,

just before dawn—or fragrant musk exhaling its perfume?

Are these freshly gathered roses, or luxuriant gardens

clothed by the hand of the rain-clouds in finely figured brocade?

Are they the flowers of a sky, or the blossoms of a meadow

watered in its thirst by morning rain-clouds pouring abundantly?

Its supple, graceful branches began to dance

for a bird perched upon their crowns, singing melodiously.

Or is it the sun, shining at the zenith of perfection?

Or the full moon risen in the firmament of eminence?

Is it glad tidings after despair, or a promise amid hope?

By God, how sweet, how radiant, and how noble!

O rider, if you happen to pass that way, turn aside toward

the hills of Damascus—may you be guided aright as you make for them.

Stop awhile in its sacred valley, proclaiming:

How lovely the valley! How lovely the sanctuary!

For upon the land of Syria there has alighted a light of guidance

whose gleaming radiance surpasses the full moon in the sky.

The surrounding lands now glory in their illumination,

and the branch of hopes has grown through joy.

Do you not behold the verdant land? It has displayed garments

of light, which spring adorned and richly patterned.

The season’s first rain came early to it, scattering pearls

of dew, strung upon the thread of splendor.

Among the great trees of the two Nayrab gardens, doves sang,

and a ringdove answered them, reciting in a murmuring strain,

in honor of the tread of the age’s great shaykh, the chief of its judges—

an imam at whose thresholds good fortune has pitched its tents:

astute, awe-inspiring, keen-witted, refined;

a noble man whose bounty shames the rain-cloud when it pours;

a deliverer of the distressed, a refuge for the fearful,

a haven for the sorrowful who comes complaining of wrong.

O peerless man of the world, O scholar before whom

glory—and the eminent chief himself—has yielded in submission;

O master who has gathered every virtue,

whom no scholar meets without drawing back in awe;

O you whose justice has become renowned in every region,

reaching both the highlands and the lowlands throughout the land.

I have sought the summits of your lofty honor, for Time has wronged

me, and other than your door I have nowhere to turn.

I have a wounded eye whose sleeplessness has lasted long,

and a heart set ablaze by the fires of estrangement.

Perhaps, my lord, you will pity my need

and grant me justice against your servant, Time, now that

I have dependents—my Lord knows well their condition—

and for their sake my heart has become a blaze of glowing coals.

And I have a soul that regards asking as humiliation,

save that it hopes for your bounty as an act of grace.

For in eloquence you are Quss, and in generosity Hatim,

and your munificence, O sea of noble deeds, has overflowed.

May your abundant generosity bring a blessing

that quenches one distraught by the agony of thirst.

May you endure as long as the two luminaries, blessed

through all eternity, so long as a ring-necked dove coos, and so long as...