They say that one night, while Mālik ibn al-Rayb was out on a raid, a wolf attacked him in his sleep. He drove it off, but without success, for the wolf returned and would not give ground. So Mālik fell upon it with his sword, and slew it, and this is his poem about the incident (meter: ṭawīl):
Hey wolf of the scrub, now the stock of human laughter:
From east to west, report of you will spread from rider to rider.
Bold-hearted though you were, you met the lion
whose neck is strong, whose bite is stronger,
who never sleeps at night without the sword
that's quick to violence in defense of people.
Hey wolf, my stealthy nighttime caller:
Did you take me for a dull-witted person?
Several times I drove you off, and when you wore me down
and would not be shooed away, I curbed your nuisance.
And now, at the feet of the son of a noble dame, you are made carrion
by a bright cutter that delivers from oppression.
Many's the dubious battle where, had you been present,
the memory of me amid the fray would scare you still,
and the sight of my fallen foe in armor
with his hands fixed in the earth [that he died clawing],
worsted by the brave-hearted fighter whose
opponents wish their hearts could flutter back to them,
would be haunting you.
With a sword of two sharp edges I leap, and toward death
I walk proudly, where my peers dawdle like mangy camels.
When I see death. I don't shrink from it in a deferential way.
When I ride into narrow straits, it is by choice.
But when my soul will tolerate no more, steer clear
and back off, lest your entire community be scattered in terror.
From the Book of Songs
