219.
My comrades all are gone; Death, deadly foe,
Has caught them one by one, and trampled low;
They shared life's feast, and drank its wine with me.
But lost their heads, and dropped a while ago.
220.
Those hypocrites, all know so well, who lurk
In streets to beg their bread, and will not work,
Claim to be saints, like Shibli and Junaid,
No Shiblis are they, though well known in Karkh!
221.
When the great Founder moulded me of old.
He mixed much baser metal with my gold;
Better or fairer I can never be
Than I first issued from his heavenly mould.
219. C. L. A. I. Quoted by Badáúní, ii. 159.
220. C. L. A. I. L. reads bakahna namad, but the line will not scan with that reading. Line 4 is in metre 9. A saint called Ma'ruf i Karkhi, "the famed one of Karkh," is mentioned in the Nafahát ul Uns. Karkh was a suburb of Bagdad.
