لذ لي في حبكم كلفي

وبكم لي قد حلا تلفي

My ardor in loving you is sweet to me;

And through you, my ruin has grown sweet to me.

والذي ترضون من شغفي

ذاك عندي غاية الشرف

And whatever you approve of in my passion,

That, to me, is the height of honor.

عاذلي مت حسرة واسى

لم تنل مني سوى الاسف

My reproacher, die of heartbreak and sorrow;

You have gained from me nothing but grief.

كيف اسلو عن محبتكم

لا ولا الآيات والصحف

How can I cease loving you?

No—by the verses and the scriptures!

يالقومي من رشا غنج

تائه بالعجب والصلف

O my people, help me against a coquettish fawn,

Haughty with conceit and arrogance,

حسن الاوصاف ذي ترف

حرت بين الحسن والترف

Fair in features, endowed with delicacy;

I am bewildered between beauty and delicacy.

بدر تم قد كلفت به

جل أوصافا عن الكلف

A perfect full moon, with whom I have become infatuated,

Exalted in his qualities above all blemishes.

فهو ظبي غير ملتفت

وهو غصن غير منعطف

For he is a gazelle that does not turn,

And he is a branch that does not bend.

كيف قلبي عنه اصرفه

وهواه غير منصرف

How can I turn my heart away from him,

When love for him will not depart?

راح فيه راح معتدلا

خلني من قول منحرف

Wine is within him; he walks upright. (Reading uncertain.)

Spare me the words of one gone astray!

قده بالشعر معتنق

كاعتناق اللام بالالف

His figure is embraced by his hair,

As lām embraces alif.

عنه غصن البان حدثنا

خلف يرويه عن خلف

Of him, the bān branch told us,

One generation relating it from another:

ان غصان النقا نقلت

عنه حسن اللين والهيف

That the branches of the dunes borrowed

From him the beauty of suppleness and slenderness.