أفكر!

أوتار مبعثرة
ترجمة إنجليزية
شارك:
قَالَتْ: أُفَكِّرُ! فِي مَاذَا تُفَكِّرُهَا؟فِي أَنْ تَرَاكَ، تَرَاهَا أَنْتَ تُبْصِرُهَا؟
تَبًّا لِقَلْبِيَ مُشْتَاقًا يَتُوقُ لِمَايُذِلُّهُ فِي هَوَاهُ كَيْفَ يَنْظُرُهَا؟
أَقْسَمْتُ أَنْ لَيْسَ فِي دُنْيَا الْوَرَى أَحَدٌأَبْهَى وَأَجْمَلَ مِنْهَا حِينَ تَنْظُرُهَا
وَيْحِي عَلَى مُقْلَةٍ لَا حُسْنَ يَمْلَؤُهَافِي الْكَوْنِ إِلَّاكِ مَهْمَا كَانَ يُبْهِرُهَا
وَيْلِي عَلَى مُهْجَةٍ أَغْرَتْهُ بَسْمَتُهَاوَمَا سِوَى حُسْنِهَا فِي الْحُبِّ يَأْسِرُهَا
هَلْ بِتُّ أَشْحَذُ رُؤْيَاهَا؟ وَكُنْتُ لَهَاكَثَوْبِهَا.. أَلْثُمُ الْأَعْطَافَ، أَسْتُرُهَا
تَوَسَّلَتْ كَلِمَاتِي وَاكْتَفَيْتُ بِهَاتَوَسُّلًا فَإِذَا لَمْ تُجْدِ أَحْذَرُهَا
وَلَنْ أَعُودَ لَهَا مَهْمَا هَفَوْتُ جَوًىكَفَى كَفَى إِنَّ ذُلَّ النَّفْسِ يُصْغِرُهَا!

I’m Thinking!

  1. She said: “I'm thinking!” Thinking of what?
    Of seeing you? And do you think you'll ever see her?1
  2. A curse on my heart, that longs and craves what brings it low
    in its love! How can it still look to her?
  3. I have sworn that in the whole world of men there is no one
    more radiant and lovely than she is, when you look at her.
  4. Woe is me for an eye that no beauty in creation fills
    but you, however much else may dazzle it!
  5. Alas for a heart lured on by her smile,
    that nothing but her beauty can, in love, make prisoner!
  6. Have I come to begging for a glimpse of her, I who to her
    was like her own garment2, kissing her sides, covering her?
  7. My words have pleaded, and I made do with them
    as my plea; and if they fail, I shall beware of them3.
  8. I will not go back to her, however much in passion I slip and yearn4.
    Enough, enough! Humiliation makes the soul grow smaller!

Notes

  1. The poet argues with himself. She has said only ‘I’m thinking!’, and he, addressing himself as ‘you’, asks what she could be thinking about: could it be seeing him? And does he really suppose he will get to see her? The pronouns shift quickly between ‘you’ and ‘her’, as they do in the whole poem, where he speaks of her, then to her (verse 4), then of her again. ↩
  2. ‘Like her own garment’ recalls the Qurʾanic image of spouses: ‘They are a garment for you and you are a garment for them’ (Qurʾan 2:187), the garment that touches, covers and protects. The one who was that close is now reduced to begging for a sight of her. ↩
  3. Aḥdharuhā, ‘I shall beware of them’, refers to the words themselves: if pleading avails nothing, he will be wary of pleading again. ↩
  4. Hafawtu can mean ‘I slipped, I erred’ (from hafwa, a lapse) and also ‘I yearned, my heart flew towards her’ (from hafā). Both are meant: even if longing makes him lapse and yearn for her, he will not go back. ↩

English translation prepared by artificial intelligence and reviewed against the Arabic for accuracy of meaning and rhetoric.