Page:Muhammad Diyab al-Itlidi - Historical Tales and Anecdotes of the Time of the Early Khalîfahs - Alice Frere - 1873.djvu/322

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 * Than distance no greater affliction can fall on one.
 * And the union is broken, and the heart is consumed,
 * And tears overflow, for the caravan has gone.
 * So was my heart when their camels departed,
 * As wasted by sickness or drunk with wine.
 * Though the camels had knelt, yet at dawn they arose,
 * And by hers my beloved one was borne away.
 * But her glance to a chink in her prison she turned,
 * Looking toward me with tears from her eye streaming down.
 * O cameleer! go slowly, that I may bid them farewell.
 * O cameleer! in thy departure is my death.
 * By thy truth! I shall never forget my intercourse with them,
 * Would I had known their long agreement to their deed!

Abu-ʾl-ʾAbbâs, el-Mubárrad, continues: "And when I had ended my poem, he asked me, 'What was their deed?' I answered, Their death.'

"Then he cried with a loud cry, and fell down swooning. And I shook him, but found that he had really died. May God have mercy upon him!"

Watson and Hazell, Printers, London and Aylesbury.