I: What pleasure shall the dead in heart take…

What pleasure shall the dead in heart take in beauty's display?
With Layla's blandishments, what shall Majnun's image do?

When, like unto the gazelle, they will not be familiar with any one,
What shall the effect of constancy with those bright eyes do?

The appliances of joy and pleasure were useless, unto the forsaken:
With the arrival of the morning's breeze, what shall the turban's chaplet do?

Since, like unto the dawn of morning, his garment may be rent,
How can one, as this so infamous, his condition conceal?

They never derive any share whatever of hands and feet,
What then shall the world of fishes with the hinna's bright dye do?

Folly and vanity have made thee lighter even than the bubble:
What shall the foaming of the ocean towards thy weight and power do?

Nourish not the hope, O Alexander! that it will to thee be constant:
Behold, what the vicissitudes of fortune shall unto Darius do!

By the violence of its ravages, the whole hath been to ruin brought,
Otherwise, in the desert, what doth the litter of its camel do?

Did he, like unto a falcon, soar in air, then it might avail;
But what shall the restraint of that net, now, unto Shaida do?