1. My sleep has flown, and sorrow has returned to my heart,
Reluctant is slumber to visit me, so great is my grief.

2. Little is my patience, and less that which consoles me,
My heart harbors wounds, and my eyelids are calloused from weeping.

3. Insomnia splits open my eyelids, and the fires
Of my heart are stoked, making pain their fuel.

4. If only my companion were near, he the pillar of my heart!
How different is what I desire from what is intended for me!

5. It is not the passing years that have aged me,
But sorrows that come in succession, and a hostile fate.

6. Thus I am like a page that has been
Polished by repeated rubbing until thin.

7. Where are my dear brothers with whom I shared
My affection, and who were all loving to me?

8. The hand of events has scattered them, and time
After gathering us, dispersed us far and wide.

9. Truly, they and I have become like
A looted encampment, its tent poles uprooted.

10. Does a world that turned its back to us
Have any loyalty? None stand firm against it.

11. What awaits us? Is there no future left for us?
Stop asking about it, for all things perish.

12. Perhaps a military patrol will pass by us
Swaying like a supple bough.

13. I will tilt my goblet and lift it to my eye,
Its rim touching my eyelids.

14. O you who ask about noble lineage -
None are nobler than we, guides to every tribe.

15. We are the House of the Prophet, the true kin,
The near relations - what more do you seek?

16. To us belongs all that the dawn has shone upon,
And all that the verses of night have made dark.

17. We have held the succession of leadership an inheritance.
Who then would boast or deviate from us?

18. Our father protected the Prophet, driving
Off enemies you know well, defending and guarding.

19. That day the confederates stirred,
To kindle war at Hunayn - fuel for the inferno.

20. Among them were hypocrites from us, and Pharaoh,
Oblivious,with his legions unaware.

21. When the people called each other to arms
None was preferred over the outcast.