arabic-poets

"They translate books of science and attribute authorship to their coreligionists."

"God has sent showers upon the abandoned dwelling-places of those we loved. He has woven upon them a striped, many-coloured garment of flowers, and raised among them a flower like a star. How many girls like images trailed their garments among such flowers, when life was fresh and time was at our service...How happy they were, those days that have passed, days of pleasure, when we lived with those who had black, flowing hair and white shoulders...Now say to Destiny whose favours have vanished – favours I have lamented as the nights have passed – how faintly its breeze has touched me in my evening. But for him who walks in the night the stars still shine: greetings to you, Córdoba, with love and longing."

"Abu Lahab stood up and shouted angrily, "Perish you, Mohammad! Did you invite us here for this?" The answer to Abu Lahab's challenge came in verse 1 of sura 111 (ol-Masad), in which the same Arabic word meaning "perish" appears: "Perish Abu Lahab's hands, and may he (himself) perish!" ... Nor would his wife, Omm Jomayyel, who had strewn thorns in the Prophet's path, be left unpunished: "And his wife, the carrier of the firewood sticks, will have a rope of palm fiber on her neck.""

"We reject the reprobate, His words we repudiate, His religion we loathe and hate."

"You have asked one who knows. The hearts of the people are with you, but their swords are with the Banu Umayyah. The decision will come from heaven, and Allah will do what He wishes."

"I have grown weary of the troubles of life. I know what has happened to-day and yesterday, before it, but verily, of the knowledge of what will happen to-morrow. I see death is like the blundering of a blind camel;—him whom he meets he kills, and he whom he misses lives and will become old. He who does not act with kindness in many affairs will be torn by teeth and trampled under foot. And he, who makes benevolent acts intervene before honor, increases his honor; and he, who does not avoid abuse, will be abused. He who keeps his word, will not be reviled; and he whose heart is guided to self-satisfying benevolence will not stammer. He who dreads the causes of death, they will reach him, even if he ascends the tracts of the heavens with a ladder. He, who is always seeking to bear the burdens of other people, and does not excuse himself from it, will one day by reason of his abasement, repent. Many silent ones you see, pleasing to you, but their excess in wisdom or deficiency will appear at the time of talking. The tongue of a man is one half, and the other half is his mind, and here is nothing besides these two, except the shape of the blood and the flesh. Verily, as to the folly of an old man there is no wisdom after it, but the young man after his folly may become wise."

"If you do not know what death is, then look at Hāni' and Ibn 'Aqīl in the marketplace. Look at a hero whose face the sword has covered with wounds and another who fell dead from a high place. The command of the governor struck them down, and they became legends for those who travel on every road. You see a corpse whose color death has changed and a spattering of blood that has flowed abundantly, A young man who was even more bashful than a shy young woman yet was more decisive than the polished blade of a two-edged sword. Is Asmā' riding in peace a mount that moves at walking pace While Madhhij seeks vengeance against him? All Murād throng around him. Each one of them, whether a questioner or a questioned, is apprehensively watchful. If you don not avenge your two brothers, then be harlots, satisfied with little."

"وَإِنَّمَا الْأُمَمُ الْأَخْلَاقُ مَا بَقِيَتْ / فَإِنْ هُمُ ذَهَبَتْ أَخْلَاقُهُمْ ذَهَبُوا"

"While I spoke thus to myself, my companions stopped their coursers by my side, and said, "Perish not through despair, but act with fortitude." Ah, said I, the vehicles which bore away my fair one on the morning when the tribe of Malec departed, and their camels were traversing the banks of Deda, resembled large ships Sailing from Aduli; or vessels of the merchant Ibn Yamin, which the mariner now turns obliquely, and now steers in a direct course; Ships, which cleave the foaming waves with their prows, as a boy at his play divides with his hand the collected earth.In that tribe was a lovely antelope, with black eyes, dark ruddy lips, and a beautiful neck, gracefully raised to crop the fresh berries of erac—a neck adorned with two strings of pearls and topazes. She strays from her young, and feeds with the herd of roes in the tangled thicket, where she browses the edges of the wild fruit, and covers herself with a mantle of leaves. She smiles, and displays her bright teeth, rising from their dark-coloured bases, like a privet-plant in full bloom, which pierces a bank of pure sand moistened with dew: To her teeth the sun has imparted his brilliant water; but not to the part where they grow, which is sprinkled with lead-ore, while the ivory remains unspotted. Her face appears to be wrapped in a veil of sunbeams; unblemished is her complexion, and her skin is without a wrinkle."

"I shall not stop, I shall not stop Beneath the moon clothed in white, Drowning in the morrow With a fast-beating heart. You remain mine, when I am aware, You remain mine, when I am unaware. There, in the dome of mist, In the wells of spacious churches, In festivals And the glimmering of windows, The fields of folk-song, The desperate hum of din, The departure of ships and wine, You remain mine. The shriveled and the fresh stop short, And the earth stretches forth its head And pursues us from word to word, From bird To bird I heard from afar, And when I tried to approach, You held up your hand. I heard from afar And saw the ancient peoples There, beyond the woods."

"Fair were they also, diffusing the odor of musk as they moved, Like the soft zephyr bringing with it the scent of the clove."

"The Prophet Muhammad is said to have called Imru’ al-Qays "the leader of the poets into hellfire.""

"Dear ruins! Many a year has been closed, many a month, holy and unhallowed, has elapsed, since I exchanged tender vows with their fair inhabitants!"

"I stood asking news of the ruins concerning their lovely habitants; but what avail my questions to dreary rocks, who answer them only by their echo?"

"I passed by the sentries on watch near her, and a people desirous of killing me; If they could conceal my murder, being unable to assail me openly."

"DESOLATE are the mansions of the fair, the stations in Minia, where they rested, and those where they fixed their abodes! Wild are the hills of Goul, and deserted is the summit of Rijaam. The canals of Rayaan are destroyed: the remains of them are laid bare and smoothed by the floods, like characters engraved on the solid rocks. Dear ruins! Many a year has been closed, many a month, holy and unhallowed, has elapsed, since I exchanged tender vows with their fair inhabitants! The rainy constellations of spring have made their hills green and luxuriant: the drops from the thunder-clouds have drenched them with profuse as well as with gentle showers: Showers, from every nightly cloud, from every cloud veiling the horizon at day-break, and from every evening cloud, responsive with hoarse murmurs. Here the wild eringo-plants raise their tops: here the antelopes bring forth their young, by the sides of the valley: and here the ostriches drop their eggs. The large-eyed wild-cows lie suckling their young, a few days old—their young, who will soon become a herd on the plain. The torrents have cleared the rubbish, and disclosed the traces of habitations, as the reeds of a writer restore effaced letters in a book; Or as the black dust, sprinkled over the varied marks on a fair hand, brings to view with a brighter tint the blue stains of woad. I stood asking news of the ruins concerning their lovely habitants; but what avail my questions to dreary rocks, who answer them only by their echo?"

"Has anything deceived you about me, that your love is killing me, And that verily as often as you order my heart, it will do what you order?"

"Yea, everything is vain, except only God alone, and every pleasant thing must one day vanish away! And all the race of men—there shall surely come among them a Fearful Woe, whereby their fingers shall grow pale: And every mother's son, though his life be lengthened out to the utmost bound, comes home at last to the Grave: And every man shall know one day his labour's worth, when his loss or gain is cast up on the Judgment Day."

"A group of women around a shattered man. I said with a smile: Let's call him Qais, Laila's mad lover. The termperature sank abruptly. Never in my life did I see eyes like those with trailing dresses. The moment I left him they had, of course, to come after me. And there they waited for me, one after the other. I was in a rural city, a strange place on the banks of a river. And even without my smiling, the shattered man had tired me. It was in the old house that our meeting took place, and my jokes turned into blood. I killed them with classic boredom."

"Stop, oh my friends, let us pause to weep over the remembrance of my beloved. Here was her abode on the edge of the sandy desert between Dakhool and Howmal. The traces of her encampment are not wholly obliterated even now; For when the South wind blows the sand over them the North wind sweeps it away. The courtyards and enclosures of the old home have become desolate; The dung of the wild deer lies there thick as the seeds of pepper. On the morning of our separation it was as if I stood in the gardens of our tribe, Amid the acacia-shrubs where my eyes were blinded with tears by the smart from the bursting pods of colocynth. As I lament thus in the place made desolate, my friends stop their camels; They cry to me "Do not die of grief; bear this sorrow patiently." Nay, the cure of my sorrow must come from gushing tears. Yet, is there any hope that this desolation can bring me solace?"

"Weep for me, my eyes! Spill your tears And mourn for me the vanished kings Hujr ibn 'Amru's princely sons Led away to slaughter at eventide; If only they had died in combat Not in the lands of Banu Marina! No water was there to wash their fallen heads, And their skulls lie spattered with blood Pecked over by birds Who tear out first the eyebrows, then the eyes."

"Thus the tears flowed down on my breast, remembering days of love; The tears wetted even my sword-belt, so tender was my love."

"Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither a talker, nor a seeker, nor am I argumentite Light makes me restuve sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither earthy, nor the wind, neither water nor as fire ignite Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither from jinns, nor from humans, neither mother nor father recondite Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither Sunni, nor Shia, neither sinner nor recompensite Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither law-abider nor abstemious, nor given to physical delight Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Neither a scholar nor a judge, nor rowdy drink's acolyte Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light Which substance of School do you look for? he's with you and in flight Light makes me restive sweet Lord, restive am I for light."

"Who are you, who am I, I'm manifest in the same On our heads we secured, a chaplet in a frame."

"All this is strolling of the sea, neither any shore nor dinghy Into the waters of oneness, flying away this very entity Cease the moment forget all else, all that bygone history The future and past abandon, Sachal ask for frenzy."

"My thoughts are not to eminence inclined, nor I ask to be the master Neither then prelates, elders we became, nor then my name's Astrologer Neither Indian, Sindhi, Arab, nor to being a Negro or Turk aver Sachal nowhere is anyone present, within nothingness we occur."

"Thou hast succeeded to the throne, and didst not revile 'Ali, nor terrify The innocent man, nor follow the counsel of the evil-doer; Thou didst speak, and didst confirm what thou didst say by what Thou didst do, and every Muslim became well content."

"Poetry has sunk into the earth, and the lush tree of letters, once watered, has gone dry."

"I am embarrassed that I have a translator for my works, and Mutanabbi, the poet of the Arabs, has no one."

"A charger's saddle is an exalted throne, the best companions are books alone."

"Defiantly live, or in honour die, Midst slashing blades and banners flying high."

"Beautiful women, as experienced men know, Are but darkness wrapped in dazzling light aglow. A life of friv'lous youth and worried age, Its futile course to futile death will flow."

"A young soul in my ageing body […] Hard biter in a toothless mouth is she."

"وَما ضَرَّها خَلقٌ بِغَيرِ مَخالِبٍ *** وَقَد خُلِقَت أَسيافُهُ وَالقَوائِمُ"

"Without hardship everyone would prevail."

"وَيَطلِبُ عِندَ الناسِ ما عِندَ نَفسِهِ *** وَذَلِكَ ما لا تَدَّعيهِ الضَراغِمُ"

"ما كُلُّ ما يَتَمَنّى المَرءُ يُدرِكُهُ   تَجري الرِياحُ بِما لا تَشتَهي السُفُنُ"

"أنا الذي نظر الأعمى إلى أدبي   وأسمعت كلماتي من به صمم"

"أَنَامُ مِلْءَ جُفُونِي عَنْ شَوَارِدِهَا *** وَيَسْهَرُ الْخَلْقُ جَرَّاهَا وَيَخْتَصِمُ"

"Glory in hardship, sloth in comfort lies."

"إِنَّ السِلاحَ جَميعُ الناسِ تَحمِلُهُ   وَلَيسَ كُلُّ ذَواتِ المِخلَبِ السَبُعُ"

"إذا رَأيْتَ نُيُوبَ اللّيْثِ بارِزَةً   فَلا تَظُنّنّ أنّ اللّيْثَ يَبْتَسِمُ"

"أعَزُّ مَكانٍ في الدُّنَى سَرْجُ سابحٍ   وَخَيرُ جَليسٍ في الزّمانٍ كِتابُ"

"الخَيْلُ وَاللّيْلُ وَالبَيْداءُ تَعرِفُني   وَالسّيفُ وَالرّمحُ والقرْطاسُ وَالقَلَمُ"

"إِذَا أَنْتَ أَكْرَمْتَ الْكَرِيمَ مَلَكْتَهُ   وَإِنْ أَنْتَ أَكْرَمْتَ اللَّئِيمَ تَمَرَّدَا"

"His asceticism, his deep sense of right and wrong, his powerful intellect, his prodigious memory, and his wide range of learning, are alike acknowledged by both friend and foe."

"If I had but a garden for a bower Wherein the roses of Damascus flower, How happy, with the Luzumiyat in hand, To pass the afternoon and sunset hour!"

"History shows that many freethinkers, not daring to express their thoughts freely, have sheltered themselves behind a religion in which they disbelieved. Such was Euripides, and such was Ma'arri. In the works of both we find three elements:"

"Abu'l-Ala is a poet many centuries ahead of his time."

"A little doubt is better than total credulity."