Sol 6.1

  1. لك الخير من طيف على النأي طارقِ

    ثَوَى ريْثَما ولّى ولا لمع بارِق

    Blessings on you, phantom visiting by night despite the distance!

    It lingered only to depart, not even as long as a lightning flash.

  2. سبى ما جنى من وصله بصدوده

    رجاء ووصلاً من تلافي مفارق

    Its withdrawal stole what its nearness had won:

    hope and union through reunion with a parted beloved.

  3. ألمّ بنا والليل في درع ثاكل

    لِواحدِها والنجم في لون عاشق

    It visited us while night wore a bereaved mother's gown,

    mourning her only child, and the star wore a lover's pallor.

  4. فثرنا إلى الأكوار والعيس نوَم

    تؤُمَ بنا أقصى بلاد المشارق

    So we sprang toward the camel-saddles while the white camels slept,

    heading with us for the farthest eastern lands.

  5. نهاجر دار العامرية والحمى

    إلى أرض غزلان الظُّبى والمناطق

    We forsake al-ʿAmiriyya's home and the protected pasture

    for the land of gazelles with sword-blades and belts.

  6. أبادية الأعراب أهلَكِ إنني

    ببادية الأتراك نيطت علائقي

    O desert of the Bedouins, keep your people; I

    have bound my affections to the desert of the Turks.

  7. وأرضَك يا نجل العيون فإنني

    فتنت بذاك الفاتر المتضايق

    And keep your land, O wide-eyed ones, for I

    have been bewitched by that languid, narrowed eye.

  8. خليلَي واهاً لليالي وصرفها

    لقسد ثقَّفَتْ إلا كعوب خلائقي

    My two friends, alas for the nights and their vicissitudes!

    Indeed, they have straightened all but the joints of my character.

  9. ألم ترني بعد النُّهى وبلوغها

    رجعت لأوطار الشباب الغرانق

    Have you not seen me, after attaining mature judgment,

    return to the yearnings of tender youth?

  10. إذا سجع القُمريّ راسلت لحنه

    بإيقاع دمع للغناء موافق

    When the turtledove coos, I answer its melody

    with a rhythm of tears that matches its song.

  11. حياء لأحلامي لِصِيتي لهمتي

    لعزمي لتحريدي لهدي المفارق

    Shame before my wisdom, my renown, my ambition,

    my resolve, my seclusion, the dignity of my hair-partings!

  12. ألم يك في خمس وعشرين حجة

    تسنَّمتها هاد لمُثلى الطرائق

    Was there not, in twenty-five years

    I had climbed, a guide to the best of paths?

  13. وليل كذكراه كمعناه كاسمه

    كدِين ابن عبَّاد كادبار فائق

    And a night—like its memory, like its meaning, like its name,

    like Ibn ʿAbbad's faith, like Faʾiq's retreat—

  14. شققنا بأيدي العيس برد فلاته

    وبتنا على وعد من الصبح صادق

    we rent its desert's cloak with the white camels' forelegs,

    and passed the night trusting dawn's truthful promise.

  15. تزجّ بن الأسفار في كل شاهق

    أنا كُرة في ظهره غير لائق

    Journeys thrust us onto every towering mount;

    I am a ball upon its back, ill-fitted there.

  16. كأن مطايانا شفار كأنما

    تمد إليهن الفلا كف سارق

    As though our mounts were blade-edges, as though

    the wilderness stretched a thief's hand toward them.

  17. كأن الفلا في خندق من ظلامه

    دجى والدجى من أُفقه في سرادق

    As though the wastes, in a trench of its darkness,

    were gloom, and gloom from its horizon lay in a pavilion.

  18. كأن نجوم الليل نظارة لنا

    تعجب من آمالنا والعوائق

    As though the night's stars were spectators watching us,

    marveling at our hopes and the obstacles.

  19. كأن نسيم الصبح فرصة آيس

    كأن سراب القيظ خجلة وامق

    As though dawn's breeze were a despairing one's chance,

    as though the mirage of summer heat were a lover's blush,

  20. كأن هدير الرعد ضجة ناشز

    شكت من وميض البرق ضربة فالق

    as though thunder's roar were a rebellious wife's cry,

    complaining of a cleaving blow from lightning's flash.

  21. كأن سماء الدّجن لولا انقشاعها

    يَدَا خلَفٍ عند الندا والصواعق

    As though the cloud-dark sky, but for its clearing,

    were Khalaf's two hands in bounty and thunderbolts.

  22. لعمري لئن منّ الوزير فإنما

    يمن على عبد بنعماه ناطق

    By my life, if the vizier bestows a favor, he only

    bestows it on a servant who proclaims his bounty.

  23. إذا اقتضت منه خراسان لفظة

    أماطت نساء العرب در المخانق

    When Khurasan asks him for a word,

    the Arab women cast aside the pearls of their necklaces.

  24. يلح على شوس القوافي وصيدها

    فيلبسها ماء المعاني الدقائق

    He presses hard upon the fierce and haughty rhymes,

    and clothes them in the luster of subtle meanings.

  25. أبعد وزير المشرقين أزفها

    على مِلك رُدّت إذنْ في حمالقي

    After the vizier of the two Easts, shall I lead her as a bride

    to a king? Then may she be sent back into my inner eyelids!