قفا نبك من ذكرى حبيب وعرفان

Halt, both of you, let us weep for the memory of a beloved and her traces, / at a camping-ground whose ruins have vanished since ages past.

Years have passed over it after my time, until it has become / like the tracing of a Zabur script in the prayer books of monks.

I remembered the entire tribe through them, and it stirred up / the lingering roots of an illness deep within my heart and soul.

My tears poured down onto my cloak until it seemed / as though they were heavy, continuous downpours from a rainstorm.

If a man does not guard his own tongue, / then nothing belonging to him will ever be guarded.

And if you should see me upon Jabir's saddle-rig, / on a narrow ledge while my burial shrouds flap in the wind,

Then how many a distressed warrior have I turned back to rescue, / and how many a captive have I freed from his iron collar, so that he praised me!

And true companions I roused at early dawn, / so that they all arose between dazed and intoxicated.

And a vast, distant wilderness I have cut to its core, / mounted upon a strong, smooth-striding, obedient beast.

And a rain-storm whose colors match the fana plant I descended into, / where every heavy, weeping cloud took its turn.

Upon a steed that offers you its running styles before you even ask, / never stiff nor sluggish, but bursting with energy.

Like a tawny desert gazelle upon whom has swooped / an eagle, plunging down from the crags of Mount Thahlan.

And a barren wasteland like the hollow of a wild ass, a trackless maze, / which I crossed atop a lean-faced, dark-coated, swift stallion.

It deflects the flanks of the mounts with its robust frame, / just as a supple branch sways gently over other branches.

And a swift runner like a mountain torrent, reaching / the enemy's territory with pomp, power, and grand columns.

I drove them onward until their riding beasts grew weary, / and until the noble steeds no longer needed to be led by reins.

And until you see the once-stout, plump bay horse / now abandoned to scavenging vultures and eagles.