Translation:Muhammad III's poem in Ibn al-Khatib's al-Lamha/1

by Muhammad III of Granada

A page from Ibn al-Khatib's Al-Lamha (1928 or 1929 edition) containing the poem (seven lines separated into halves on the top half of the page). There is another poem on the bottom half.

She made me a promise and broke it;
how little loyalty women have!
She reneged from her pledge and did not keep it;
she wouldn't have broken it if it had been fair!
How come she shows no sympathy
for an ardent lover who never stops inviting her affection,
who seeks all the news about her
and contemplates the lightning when it flashes?
I hid my ailment from the eyes of men,
but my love became clear after having been hidden.
Oh, how many nights I spent drinking
the wine of those lovely lips!
[Now] I've been denied her company,
without breaking a pledge, which I fear she has broken.

Original Arabic

واعدني وعداًء وقد أخلفا أقل شيء في الملاح الوفا
وحال عن عهدي ولم يرعه ما ضرّه لو أنه أنصافا
ما بالها لم تتعطف على صبّ لها ما زال مستعطفا
يستطلع الأنباء من نحوها ويرقب البرق إذا ما هفا
خفيت سقماً عن عيان الورى وبان حبي بعد ما قدخفى
لله كم من ليلة بتُّها أُدير من ذاك اللمى قرقفا
منعتني بالوصل منها وما أخلفت عهداً خفتُ أن يخلفا

Sources

• Ibn al-Khaṭīb (1928–1929) [1347 AH]. Muhibb al-Din al-Khatib, ed. Al-Lamḥah al-badrīyah fī al-dawlah al-Naṣrīyah (in Arabic). Cairo: al-Maṭbaʻah al-Salafīyah. p. 49. OCLC 77948896. 
• Ibn al-Khaṭīb (2010). Historia de los reyes de la Alhambra: el resplandor de la luna llena acerca de la dinastía nazaría (in Spanish). University of Granada. ISBN 978-84-338-5186-4. OCLC 719415854.  Translated from Arabic (Ibn al-Khaṭīb 1347 AH) by Emilio Molina López.