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And quoth El Heriri[1] and saith well:
My censors say, “What is this love and doting upon him? Seest not the hair upon his cheeks that sprouts? Where is thy wit?”
Quoth I, “By Allah, an ye chide at me, I rede you note The exposition of the truth that in his eyes is writ.
But for the blackness of the down, that veils his chin and cheeks, Upon the brightness of his face no mortal gaze might sit.
A man who sojourns in a land, wherein no herbage is, Whenas the very Spring arrives, shall he depart from it?
And quoth another:
“He is consoled,” say the censors of me; but, by heaven, they lie! For solace and comfort come hardly to those for longing that sigh.
When the rose of his cheek stood blooming alone, I was not consoled; So how should I now find solace, that basil has sprung thereby?
And again:
And again:
Not with his wine I’m drunken, but with his tresses bright, That make all creatures drunken, yea, all beneath the sky.
Each of his charms doth envy the others; ay, and each To be the down so silky upon his cheek doth sigh.
These are the excellences of the boy, that women do not possess, and these suffice and more to give boys the preference in grace and glory over women.”
“God give thee health!” cried she. “Verily, thou hast imposed the discussion upon thyself; and thou hast spoken
- ↑ Aboulcasim el Heriri, the famous poet and grammarian, author of the Mecamat, the most celebrated single work in Arabic literature. He holds much the same rank in Arabic letters as Pope and Boileau in the literature of England and France and may, with much better reason, be styled “le legislateur du Parnasse (Arabe).” He was a native of Bassora and died early in the twelfth century.
- ↑ i.e. the languishing glance of his eye.
- ↑ i.e. his whiskers.
