Chorus:

O Lord, pour Thy grace and benediction upon Thy beloved, the crown of all creation.

O Lord, pour Thy grace and benediction upon Mohamed and upon our lieges, his kin and noble companions.


1) Is it from remembering past neighbours at Dhu Salam* that you mingle with blood tears shed from your eyes?

*A mythical desert rendezvous of lovers.

2) Or has the wind blown from before Kazima* and the lightning flashed in Idam's** dark?

*A name of the City of Medina.
**A mountain near the City.

3) What ails your eyes, that when you bid them cease they weep more still? What ails your heart, that when you bid it wake it wanders?

4) Reckons the lovelorn man that his love may be concealed, when a torrent's in one part of him, and in the other, a conflagration?*

*The tears, and the burning heart.

5) But for passion, you wouldn't weep at an abandoned camp, nor lie awake at night recalling the willow* and the mount.**

*A fragrant tree beneath which the Holy Prophet taught.
**Perhaps a reference to Mount Hira near Mecca.

6) So how can you deny your love, when witnesses of tears and sickness have testified to it against you?

7) Lovesick passion has written upon your cheeks two tear-lines like yellow spice and red 'anam* fruit.

*A tree of Western Arabia whose fruit is used in the making of a red dye.

8) Yes! My loved one's spirit haunted me, and denied me my sleep. For love ever obstructs pleasures with pain.

9) You who blame me for this chaste love: I seek your pardon! Yet had you judged fairly, you would not have blamed me at all.

10) May you be spared my state! I cannot hide my secret from my detractors; my sickness will not leave me.

11) You offer me sincere advice, but I hear it not. A lover is deaf to all his reproachers.

12) I suspect the council even of my own grey hairs; although their advice is far indeed from deception.


Translation: Abdal Hakim Murad, "The Mantle Adorned."

Music: Composed by Guilherme da Fonseca; performed by Mahmoud Musa, Adham Izzat, Baha Ayyub, and Kareem Nassar; conducted by Mohamed Farid Abdel-Wahab; supervised by Salwa Abdel-Wahab.