1. أَبَنَيتَ دونَ المَوتِ حِصنا

    فَأَخَذتَ مِنهُ بِذاكَ أَمنا

    Have you built a fortress against death,

    and thereby gained safety from it?

  2. هَيهاتِ كَلّا إِنَّ مَو

    تاً لا تَشُكُّ وَإِنَّ دَفنا

    Far from it! No! There is surely death—

    have no doubt—and surely burial.

  3. لَتُبَدِّلَنَّكَ غَمرَةُ الدُ

    نيا بِظَهرِ الأَرضِ بَطنا

    The world's engulfing turmoil will surely exchange for you

    the earth's surface for its belly.

  4. وَلَتَنزِلَنَّ بِمَنزِلٍ

    أَغلِق بِرَهنِكَ فيهِ رَهنا

    And you will surely descend into a dwelling—

    how irrevocably you will be held there as a pledge!

  5. فَلَقَد رَأَيتَ مَعاشِراً

    طَحَنَتهُمُ الأَيّامُ طَحنا

    For you have seen communities

    whom the days have utterly ground down.

  6. ما زالَتِ الأَيّامُ تُف

    ني أَهلَها قَرناً فَقَرنا

    The days have never ceased to destroy

    their people, generation after generation.

  7. يا ذا الَّذي سَيَرُصُّ وا

    رِثُهُ عَلَيهِ ثَراً وَلِبنا

    O you, whose heir will pile

    soil and mud bricks upon you!

  8. لَو قَد دُعيتَ غَداً لَتُس

    أَل ذا مُحاسَبَةً وَوَزنا

    If tomorrow you were summoned to be questioned

    about this, in a reckoning and a weighing,

  9. وَرَأَيتَ في ميزانِ غَي

    رِكَ ما جَمَعتَ رَأَيتَ غَبنا

    and saw in another's scales

    what you had amassed, you would see your loss.