Ode XXIV: Is there with 'Amrah any equipment

Is there with 'Amrah any equipment for the road for a traveller with a need, who goes forth on his way at evening or when morning dawns ?

He is weary of waiting after the long time he has tarried ; and he has come to the end of his desire, and will abide no longer

For the promises of one who is cunning, or for her pledges not meant to be fulfilled, though she were to swear by the black [blood of the victims] that flows [over the sacred stones].

She promised thee, then she failed to perform her promise ; and maybe what she denied thee would not have hurt her.

And I see that with fair ones ties endure not for ever, whether in poverty or even in the case of the well-to-do.

And when the tie of love that binds thee to thy friend abides not to thee, then cut off thy desire of him with a fleet she-camel, trained to leanness,

Hard and strong, large in the middle ribs, a mighty goer, a swift traveller in the noon-tide heat, of stout and sturdy frame.

She goes on steadily through the fore-noon when the strength of the other riding-camels is spent, as though she were the castle of Ibn Hayyah which he built up with bricks and overlaid with plaster.

Thou wouldst think that the leather saddle-bags and the corners of the leather cover of the saddle[, when she hurries along,] were two prominent bunches of feathers on the wings of a male ostrich fleeing in terror ;

He races alongside of a she-ostrich travelling home in the evening, whose feathers her swift course causes to fall out, as the man who fecundates the date-palms strips off and throws down the wrappings of the spathe.

The twain thought upon a nest full of eggs ranged in rows one against another, after the Sun had stretched forth her right hand to the covering Night.

Her feeding-places were far away [from the nest], and her youngling twittered to her, in fields where grew the 'a and the succulent colocynth, thick and broad.

So the two took their way together, under the gathering shade of night, with a swift even pace like the steady rushing down of an evening shower.

Then [the she-ostrich] set up, as darkness came on, her tent over the eggs, like a woman of the Hums in a black veil who lets it fall off her head.

O 'Umairah, how shouldst thou know how many young warriors, shining of countenance, famed for generous and noble deeds,

Fair in their playful speech, whose hospitality finds none to blame it, liberal of their hands [in peace], stirrers-up of battle in war,

I have anticipated in the early morning by buying a dark-coloured small skin of wine, before the dawn, and before the cock raised his clamour.

Then did I shorten the day to them by means of the wailing voice of a tall she-camel [which I caused to be slaughtered to feed them], and the singing to us of a songstress in the cloudy air, and liberal gifts to the slaughterer,

Till the day came to an end, and they returned to their homes, giving no heed to the discourse of him who rebuked their wantonness.

And many the raiding troop like a swarm of locusts have I held back before the dawn, mounted on a keen-sighted steed trained to leanness,

Full of spirit, like a casting-stone — [clad in] an ample coat of mail that turns all arrows, and armed with a pliant spear that quivers when I brandish it.

Yea, and many the girl with a fair white brow, simple and inexperienced in love, [with large black eyes] like an antelope, that charms the sight of him that gazes on her—

I have spent the night teaching her dalliance and removing her fears, until the whiteness of the dawning day shone forth.

And many the adversaries, eager, full of hatred, their breasts vomiting forth bitter wounding words,

Persistent in enmity, have I bowed down to accept that which they loathed, and have repelled their empty claims with manifest right,

By the speech of a man of decision, firm of purpose, who drives his enemy headlong, with his roaring to the roarer.