XLIV: Many, many times have I rent my garment…

Many, many times have I rent my garment before thee;
Still thou hast not removed thy guardians from my path.

Save causing thee to upbraid, and set thy face against me,
Of no other use, to me, my offerings and oblations became.

The child playeth not thus with shards and with stones,
Like as I gamble away, upon thee, my religion, and my faith.

When to such a pitiless one as thou art, I gave up my heart,
I, certainly, thrust my own self into calamity's jaws.

There are none of constancy's or fidelity's wares therein;
For the fair, in their shops, barter naught but hollowness itself.

When I come upon the paraphernalia of the heart-ravishers,
The goods and chattels of my self-control become naught to me.

Should I erect a hundred castles of patience round my heart,
I see no safety for myself, from the inroads of the fair-faced ones.

A thousand times over, they will be thankful for their condition,
Should I narrate, unto the damned, the way my life passeth.

Shouldst thou, O Hamid! come under the aspersion of love,
Account as profit, not yet acquired, this mulct of thine.