No secrets left

                 Nothing remains in doubt after
                     my assay of every enigma,
                 from what Hermes said at the beginning
                     to what Heraclius said at the end,
                 to the riddles couched by Galen
                     in twisting dodges,
                 and the primordial traditions
                     upheld by sacred revelation,
                 and the encryptions of Jabir, who
                     practiced what the ancients did.
                 For all they held back, I vindicate them.
                     For all they put forth, I have commentary.
                 From all the materials I have gathered,
                     I have clarified and broadcast every secret
                 in my Keys, the book loaded with wisdom
                     that springs the lock jammed shut,
                 and its concomitant Lamps
                     of brilliant flame,
                 like nothing produced by anyone
                     before my time or after.
                 Nothing less than the epitome
                     of every long-studied science
                         is what my verses hold.

By Mu’ayyad al-Din al-Husayn ibn ‘Ali al-Tughra’i (meter: mutaqārib)

Muwashshahat al-Nuniyya

This muwashshaha, in which Ibn al-Wakil incorporated hemistichs from the Nuniyya of Ibn Zaydun, is one of the most remarkable poems I have come across:

                Our death has been announced.
                The crier proclaims our sentence.
             Were we unschooled in sorrow, it would do us in

                The sea of love drowns
                all who try to swim it,
                     and all who fret and moon
                     the fire of love scorches.
                Many's the young hero
                whose sleep it takes away.
                     It racks and ruins bodies
                     and makes the days turn
             Lightless, when our nights with you were brilliant

                Dear confidant, mine own,
                stay a while and hear me out.
                     Beware of giving in to passion,
                     it'll burn you up.
                An ordeal to be avoided!
                So hear and spread the word.
                     The sea of love is bitter.
                     Heedless, we dove in
             And at once the crier announced our annihilation

                When hopes turn to fine young things
                you are in for disquiet.
                     My efforts were for
                     a gorgeous and inhumane lad.
                Though his only care was gift-getting,
                the favors he got he turned down.
                     And just as soon as he
                     favored me with caress or near miss,
             Morning replaced our closeness with separation

                I call on all that
                ties us together: Unless
                     you restore our union
                     and relieve my burning eyes,
                this life of isolation
                will grind me down.
                     Let it be the way it was
                     with my kin and brethren
             When the wellspring of our joys was unpolluted

                I call on the community
                that flees this lovelorn fool,
                     breaking faith with him
                     for no wrong done.
                It shouldn't be like this.
                It is a social ill.
                     They scant the damage done
                     by their estrangement
             Though ever was estrangement lovers' ruin

                O you who crowd my willow!
              "By the even and the odd,"
                     and the Ant and the Criterion,
                   "and the night when it passeth,"
                and al-Rahman and al-Hijr
                and the Bee, enlighten me:
                     Is it lawful in any religion
                     to kill a man with thirst
             For one whose pure love used to fill my cup?

                O seeker after rain!
                Turn aside at the wadi
                     of the people of Badr.
                     Mayhap your thirst
                will be quenched by a torrent
                if you stand among them and call out:
                   "Bring me to life,
                     and bring me kind word
             From a distant one whose word alone can revive me"

                My days go by
                as if they were years.
                     It used to be the
                     other way round.
                The days flew by like erotic dreams.
                I wish they'd never ended,
                     and a cup of
                     Mixed wine went flew
             between us, and the singers were singing our song

From The Whiff of Scent from a Green Bough of al-Andalus
by Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Maqqari

Fairuz and Wadi al-Safi, "Ghada Munadina."

From Qasidat al-Hubb (Baalbek, 1973).

Lyrics by Sadr al-Din ibn al-Wakil

Another biter busted

Ahmad ibn Yahya Tha‘lab was one of Ibn Abu 'l-‘Abbas ‘Abd Allah ibn al-Mu‘tazz's teachers. It is narrated that, after some time apart, Ibn al-Mu‘tazz missed him sorely, and wrote to him (meter: rajaz):

      A man in fetters thirsts
      for water from cold rainclouds sent careening
      by the wind, unsullied, unmuddied,
      shed in abundance by dark cloud cover,
      wetting the rock and coating it like reflective glass
      that would flash if the sun hit it,
      unmixed rainwater, clean and pure—
      what passion equals his desire, if not mine for you?
      And yet I dread you. Unlocker of barred knowledge,
      you are the sharp-eyed language critic who,
      if he says, "That's no good," then it won't fly.
      Now we are apart, and far from one another,
      but recollection reunites us, even though we don't unite.

Tha‘lab answered his student: "May God prolong your life! You took the opening lines from that poem of Jamil's I dictated to you: (meter: ṭawīl)

      Women thirsting at a spring. Day and night
          they hover, weakened, shrinking from the blows of rods,
      never turning away and never getting
          close enough to touch cool water.
      On every drop, their eyes are fixed. The water-keepers' voices
          are all they hear. With death for a barrier,
      are they thirstier than I, who rave in love for you,
          despite the opposition of the foe?

"And you took the closing lines from Ru’ba ibn al-‘Ajjaj!" (meter: rajaz)

      Although you do not see me, I am
      your brother still. You need vigilance, and my eye is on you,
      and I love what it sees, whether or not you are seeing me.

Ibn al-Mu‘tazz was open to his teacher's reproach, and accepted it without resentment. It is said that, later on, Tha‘lab wrote to him (meter: basīṭ):

      Tell this to your brother. Although he's far away,
          and we are not together, really we are,
      for my gaze is on his mental image
          while our homes are far apart.
      God knows I cannot recollect him.
          How to recollect the one you never forget?

From A Selection from the Poetry of Bashshar by the Khalidi brothers

Two by Ibn al-Maghribi

There was a Hanafi jurist named Baqbaq who installed himself at the Mustansiriyya Madrasa, and when the professor Kamal al-Din ibn al-Ibari died a few days later, Ibn al-Maghribi composed this mawali about him:

          Can you recite from memory a thousand rulings by Quduri?
          How about a thousand lines of Abu Hafs?
                [Ibn al-Ibari was equal to it,] but without cribsheets
                 old Baqbaq gets lost
          You're a bird of evil omen in human form,
          and bad vibes are your only share
                If you'd only pull up stakes and travel on—
                Hey screech owl! Disappear to anywhere

And in jest he addressed these verses to a friend of his (meter: sarī‘):

          Well done, my hoopoe of Bilqis!
              Well done, my permit of Iblis!
          My spy amid the sodomites
              and to the youth my go-between!
          Up now, to the monastery!
              Drink with me to clanging bells,
          where liquid gold that flows in cups
              is ransomed by what's hard and cold.
          The branches on the spreading tree
              are clothed in beauty, don't you see?
          When joy comes to your frowny face
              the cloud of gloom above our heads
          will be made shade of wings of doves
              and peacock tails in fans outspread

From Choice Notices of the Historical Record by Ibn Shakir al-Kutubi

Windblowed

This verse is by Jamil (meter: ṭawīl):

      I wish I had the power to forget her! But
          every way I go, it's like Layla's there.

It's been said that he would absent himself from [Buthayna] for fear the Evil Eye would turn her against him:

Abu Ahmad [al-Hasan ibn ‘Abd Allah al-‘Askari] learned these verses of his from [Abu Bakr Muhammad] al-Suli, who heard them from both Ahmad ibn Yahya [Tha‘lab] and Ahmad ibn Sa‘id al-Dimashqi, who heard them from al-Zubayr [ibn Bakkar], and he taught them to me (meter: ṭawīl):

      She stuck with me long enough for me to dread the Eye.
          Two days I stayed away, fearing separation.
      I found it hard. It tested my endurance, but not hers.
          My darling found my absence no vexation.

In this vein, Abu Ahmad taught me some eloquent verses by Ibrahim ibn al-‘Abbas [al-Suli], which he heard from [the other] al-Suli, who heard them from both Tha‘lab and Abu Dhakwan, who heard them directly from the poet (meter: ṭawīl):

      A passing East wind buffets the scrubland lodger.
          The stirring of that wind just breaks my heart,
      that East wind lately come from where my beloved is.
          What soul is safe from passion where the beloved used to stay?
      And now there dawns awareness of despair inside of me,
          with the sensation of your strike against my soul.

Ibrahim "raided" this motif from Dhu 'l-Rumma, who said (meter: ṭawīl):

      When wind kicks up from the direction
          of Mayy and her people, I am kicked by longing too,
      and passion wrings the tears out of my eyes.
          What soul is safe from passion where the beloved used to stay?

Al-‘Abbas ibn al-Ahnaf had a different take on it (meter: ṭawīl):

      North winds of heartbreak
          are all I see from you, Zalum.
      When you break us up through no fault of mine,
          they'll lay fault for it with you.
      My complaint is old, her rebuff nothing new,
          but the shock of it is ever renewed.

From The Register of Poetic Motifs by Abu Hilal al-‘Askari

If in Abu Dhabi 2.0

For captioned video, follow this link.

The way to Cockaigne

                The sea is the sea. A palm's a palm.
                    An elephant's an elephant. A giraffe is tall.
                Earth is earth. It faces the sky.
                    In between is where birds fly.
                And when the park is tossed by wind,
                    earth stays put while branches bend.
                Water runs on a bed of sand.
                    It shows up everywhere it flows.
                If you think it dispels hunger
                    you must be a numbskulled dope.
                Swim with your robe on. What do you get?
                    The swimmer and the robe get wet.
                I call on bananas to be peeled
                    and honeyed with sweet syrup.
                And kunafeh in sugared layers!
                    Without you, my heart burns up.
                Hashish slayers, ready me
                    the vagabond gift that slays its slayer.
                It'll revive you, if you let it.
                    And don't hold back. A small dose is wasted.
                Life is sweet when you get high.
                    So many stoners are happy in life!
                Hear me out, brothers. Its virtues are serious.
                    Take it from one with loads of experience.

By ‘Ali ibn Sudun (Meter: kāmil)

Foul weather friend

Al-Asma‘i transmitted this long poem rhymed in rā’, in sarī‘ meter [scanned more helpfully as rajaz by Badr al-Din al-‘Ayni], where each line is rhymed in the diminutive ending, signifying in most cases what is paltry and small in quantity:

                At Dhu Sudayr, the misery
                    of all who stay at al-Ghumayr
                oppresses Layla in her robe,
                    curled like a hedgehog in its hole.
                Shivers break out on my spine
                    and my chest is quivering
                like a cat who warns her kitten.
                    Parched out in the wind and rain
                and frigid cold that's no mere chill,
                    from midday to the wee small hours,
                lit barely by a slip of moon
                    (the month is only four days in),
                I fret and toss until the dawn,
                    drizzle-damp to my short hairs.
                From road to road I'm kicked along
                    until, when my poor prick juts out,
                in all its girth down to its trunk,
                    she sees the sad state of my putz.
                Her grub is stashed in a dust-brown rag,
                    the nun who goes by Umm al-Khayr.
                Disorderly her headwrap's wound.
                    The waist-sash round her smock is bound.
                She sends her warp through heddle-eyes.
                    and in the convent clangs her bell
                before cock-crow, when hens arise.
                    "I pity you!" she wails at me.
               "A fugitive from the regime
                    you seem," to which I said, "That's me!
                Without a pause, I range and rove
                    so kids can get a meal to eat,
                little ones, as bald as chicks,
                    and widows waiting on some food."
               "I rejoice in every good!"
                    she said, and oiled and combed my locks
                and served me bread with salted fish
                    pulled from the sea, or Egypt's docks,
                with oil that was sour and rancid
                    drizzled over hulled lentils,
                and some dates well desiccated.
                    She fixed me then with a lusty eye,
                and pelted me with pebbles flung,
                    aimed at my bits and wayward one.
                And when my little feast was through,
                    she joined my side and stroked my dong.
                My ostrich flew! The bird had run.
                   "You'll need to find another one,"
                I said. "Back when my strap was cut,
                    and I was like an ass in rut
                I used to rebound like an eagle.
                    But now I perch beside my grave,
                do I wait on my fate's direction?
                    Nay! by Him Who aideth me
                from birth up to my resurrection!"

From Special Properties of [the Arabic] Language by Ibn Jinni

Two recensions

A man described as ‘abāmā’ is a doltish simpleton. Jamīl said (meter: ṭawīl):

           This dolt has never joined a fight, or knelt a camel
               for its saddle as it strains against a tether.
           Herds are what he's busy at, pasture
               his eternal quest. His thoughts are of his nanny goats
           sired by a dusky buck, with horns that poke up
               from their skulls like pods of carob.
           His gut is big, and though his mind's a muddle,
               his eye is ever on the smallest kid, and long his rod.

       

Al-Aṣma‘ī said: A man who is ṭabāqā’ is without insight into what concerns him, as in the verse by Jamīl:

           This dullard's never joined a fight, or knelt a camel
               for its saddle as it strains against a tether.

This is the Basran recension of the verse as al-Aṣma‘ī recited it, and Abū ‘Ubayd reported that he said: "‘Ayāyā’ has the same meaning as ṭabāqā’, and is said of the male camel that won't mount a female." In his Book of Uncommon Words, Abū ‘Ubayd says: "A ṭabāqā’ is an impotent dullard."

From The Curtailed and the Prolonged by Abū ‘Alī al-Qālī

And the bat said

Who shuns the mob lives on. Beware of mixing with the throng! Just look at what it did for Ham. For all Ham's milling about the enclosure, Shem was the elect of God, the Apportioner.

A creature of seclusion, whose realm is the night, I am puny, but [unstoppable in flight] "like a boulder the flood washes down from a height." By day, I hide from others' view. Isolation is necessary, in my view. Night is when I unwrap myself, for "The rising of night is when impressions are strongest." The sun, when she rises, sentences my eyes to blindness, and I covet the sight of anything else. Against the sun's eye, I close my own, and where she is present, I make myself gone. Why should my heart placate what's subservient to my Lord? Fie on irreligious leanings toward what's transient and remiss: the sun who hauls her fire just to warm the solar disk!

[The bat went on to say (meter: mutaqārib): ]

  How long you've been her prisoner! How much longer will you be?
     Now, by God, the time has come to set the prisoner free.
  She showers you with affection, makes her visits known to all,
     but any circumspection on her part is hard to see.
  If you were serious about your feelings
     you would flee her when she flees,
  and turn your love to Him Whose love
     is glory, and rejoice.
  The way of faith and purity
     mends the heart and leads aright.
  To make your home inside the Garden of Eternity,
     God's love is where to put your eyes.
  While those who work away the day will find reward tomorrow,
     sleep all day rewards the wakers of the night.

From the Language of the Birds of Ibn al-Wardī

Which color is the sky

I have seen these verses in the handwriting of Ibrahim ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Su’alati, who acknowledged them as his (meter: kāmil):

      Lithe as a shoot, my tormentor in blue
         passes by, exulting in his pride.
      Tobacco smoke envelops his face, going up
         from inside him like mist on a winter's day,
      as if screening his beauty—like the full moon's
         when it rises, and dazzles in the paleness of its sky—
      as if screening it from people's eyes
         lest they fall slain by him [as have I!]

These anonymous verses are quite similar (meter: ṭawīl):

      When he comes into view, in his caftan of blue,
         swaggering with pride in outrageous beauty,
      I cannot suppress my cry of "Stop!" at all who blame me,
        "And behold my full moon in his dark sky!"

Poets and writers choose from a range of hues to describe the sky, which changes under different conditions and forms of expression. Some describe it in terms of zurqa "blueness," as in the verses above, whose authors follow this description of a girl in blue by Abu ‘Uthman al-Najim (meter: khafīf):

      Qabul surpasses the occasion when she arrays
         herself in raiment as brilliant as herself,
      dressed in blue and topped with a face
         like the full moon in the paleness of the sky.

Thus did the ancients describe it. When the sun is shining, the sky's blueness is an azure hue produced by the mixture of blue and white, the color of blood flowing in a vein.
      The sky is called akhdar "blue-green" in hadith: "No one more truthful than Abu Dharr ever went beneath the blue-green [sky] or trod the dust-brown [earth]."
      And it is called lazawardi "azure," as where Abu Hafs ibn Burd described a boy dressed in that color (meter: majzū’ al-kāmil):

      In azure silk, the sight of him
         blotted out everything else.
     "What mortal is this?" I exclaimed
         at his exorbitant beauty.
     "Let no one deny the moon," he answered
         the right to go robed in the sky!"

      Some call the sky banafsaji "violet," as where Ibn al-Mu‘tazz described a boy in opulent brocade (meter: majzū’ al-kāmil):

      I marvel at a violet robe.
         To see it is to die a lover's death.
      Dressed in it now, you are become
         a full moon in the hue of its sky.

From The Fragrance of Green Herbs and Dewy Coating on Wine-Vessels of the Tavern by Muhammad Amin al-Muhibbi

Avant ‘Udhra

Abu ‘Ubayd Allah al-Marzubani reported that Abu Bakr Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Jawhari informed him that Muhammad ibn ‘Ali al-Sulami said: It was reported to me by ‘Abd Allah ibn Abi Sa‘d that ‘Umar ibn Shabba al-Numayri said: Muhammad ibn al-Hasan told me: Muzahim ibn Zafar informed me that his uncle said:

In the land of the Banu ‘Udhra, I saw an aged man whose body was drawn in on itself like a bird's. I asked the woman attending him who this was. "It's ‘Urwa," she told me. So I bent down close and asked him, "Does your love affect you still?" He said (meter: ṭawīl):

      My gut is like a wingèd grouse of the sands,
          so very sharply does it flutter.

I went round to his left side, and he repeated the verse until I'd heard it from him four times.

Hisham ibn al-Sa’ib al-Kalbi reported that al-Nu‘man ibn Bashir said:

I was sent as tax collector to the Banu ‘Udhra, and went about collecting their taxes until, when I thought I had passed beyond their territory, a threadbare tent came into view. Lying in front of it was a young man reduced to skin and bones. On hearing my tread, he began to chant in a weak and mournful voice (meter: ṭawīl):

      To the healer of al-Yamama I'll pay what's due,
          and to the healer of Hajr—but first they must heal me.     

Just then, a rustling came from the tent, and inside it I beheld an old woman. "Old woman," I said, "come out, for this young man has passed the point of death, in my estimation." "Mine too," she said. "I haven't heard so much as a whimper from him in over a year, except these verses lamenting his departed soul" (meter: basīṭ):

      Mothers weep forever. Who weeps for me
          today? Now I am the one being subtracted.
      Today they let me hear it, but when I uplifted
          the people that I met, I heard nothing.

She came out and lo, the man had died. So I wrapped him in a shroud  and prayed over him. I asked, "Who was he?" She said, "This is ‘Urwa ibn Hizam, the man slain by love."

From Abu ‘Abd Allah al-Yazidi's recension of the Poetry of ‘Urwa ibn Hizam; cf. Poetry and Poets, the Book of Songs, the Meadows of Gold, and The Tribulations of Impassioned Lovers

Good neighbor

These verses were composed by al-‘Arji during his imprisonment
and made into a song (meter: wāfir):

      They have forsaken me. What a hero they forsake!
         One for days of battle and frontier outposts
      and fatal clashes, standing fast
         where heads of spears aim for my slaughter.
      Now daily I am hauled about in manacles,
         begging God's aid against wrongful restraint.
      As if respect and honor were not conferred through me,
         the scion of ‘Amr [who was a caliph's son]!

Muhammad ibn Zakariyya the bookbinder said: It was reported to me by Qa‘nab ibn al-Muhriz
al-Bahili that al-Asma‘i said:

Abu Hanifa had a neighbor in Kufa who could sing. He used come home drunk and singing to his room on an upper floor, from which Abu Hanifa enjoyed hearing his voice. And very often what he sang was:

      They have forsaken me. What a hero they forsake!
          One for days of battle and frontier outposts...

One night, this man crossed paths with the vice patrol, who seized him and put him in prison. Abu Hanifa missed hearing his voice that night, and made inquiries the next morning. On hearing the news, he called for his black robe and high peaked cap and put them on, and rode to see [the governor of Kufa, who was] ‘Isa ibn Musa. He told him, "I have a neighbor who was seized and imprisoned by the vice patrol yesterday, and virtue is all I know of him."
     "Bring out everyone detained yesterday by vice patrol, and let them greet Abu Hanifa," said ‘Isa. When the man was brought forth, Abu Hanifa called out, "That's him!"
      In private he said to his neighbor, "Young man, aren't you in the habit of singing every night:

      'They have forsaken me. What a hero they forsake'?

"Now tell me: have I forsaken you?"
     "By God, your honor, no," the young man said. "You've been kind and noble. May God reward you handsomely!"
     "You can go back to your singing," said Abu Hanifa. "It was congenial to me, and I see no harm in it."
     "I will!" the young hero said.

From the Book of Songs

Controversy of the sandals

          "You have gone grey before your time," they said.
               I said, "What greys my head is fear of earthquakes!
           Scalps whiten at the wrong you do to Taybah,
               and Radwa shakes, and the peaky mountains tremble."
           They said, "Black sandals are for Christians."
              "Then they follow the example of our Prophet,"
           I replied. "But the lot of you are clad in error,
               shod in what protects old ladies' feet.
           Red sandals are for women of the Maghreb,
               and in the East, yellow ones go with a trailing hem."
          "Ahmad in black sandals?" they protested.
               "This contrarian is sore confused."
          "What are the sandals that I wear among you?"
               I said. "Now put aside this fruitless strife."
          "But Ali dressed in yellow," they said.
               I said, "That Companion has naught to do with this."
           They said, "Oral and written tradition are in agreement:
               The Messenger's sandals were not the black of kohl,"
          "Pray tell," I asked, "what color were they, then?"
               Their answer to my question was "I do not know."
          "Do intelligent people deny what's well established,"
               I asked, "trespassing into what they're ignorant of?
           I marvel at such claims. They're based entirely
               on ways and means of tradition that are depraved.
           So many askers have I told about his sandals:
               'As to their blackness, my tradition is the road of roads.'"
          "Might you enlighten us," they said, "to this tradition?"
               I said, "Might I enlighten someone who's not a fool?
           Black was the color of the Messenger's sandals." To which,
               like ignorami who think they know a thing or two,
           they objected, and spoke against the truth in sight of God,
               and every mortal being from high to low.
           They broke the staff of Islam, rejecting sunna,
               and shredded centuries' worth of scholarly consensus.
           So I fought them until, fearing for their buttress,
               they slunk in shame and repentance to their homes.
           Helpless before the rampant lion of knowledge,
               they wrung their hands after their overthrow at mine.
           For I schooled them in the truth until they learned it,
               while they slept on it like idiots who drool.
           I schooled them in the truth until they learned it,
               whose education was a kitchen mule's.
           I schooled them in the truth until they learned it,
               who were no better trained than hyena pups.
           I schooled them in the truth until they learned it,
               and voided the vain humbug of their views.
           I strung pearls of truth and knowledge for safekeeping,
               and hung it round their necks devoid of truth,
           and guided them like lambs without a shepherd
               out of straying, clear of error, to the truth.

Verses 22-46 of a 131-verse invective poem (meter: ṭawīl)
by Muhammad Mahmud al-Turkuzi al-Shinqiti,
dated 1307 A.H. (1889-90 CE)

With thanks to Zekeria Ahmed Salem

No two hearts

Mujahid said: "'God does not put two hearts in one man's bosom' was revealed concerning a man of Quraysh who claimed to have two hearts, as a boast of of his mental abilities. He used to say, 'In my bosom, there are two hearts, and each one of them has more intellectual capacity than Muhammad.' This man was from the Banu Fihr."

Al-Wahidi, al-Qushayri, and others say: "This was revealed concerning Jamil ibn Ma‘mar al-Fihri, a man of prodigious memory for everything he heard. 'Anyone who can remember so many things must have two hearts,' said the Quraysh. 'I have two hearts,' he used to say, 'both of which have more intellectual capacity than Muhammad.'
     "Jamil ibn Ma‘mar was with the idolaters at the battle of Badr when they were put to flight. Abu Sufyan saw him mounted on an ass, with one sandal fastened to his hand and the other to his foot. 'How's the battle going?' he asked him. 'Our people have been put to flight,' Jamil said. 'So why do you have one sandal on your hand and the other on your foot?' asked Abu Sufyan. 'I thought they were both on my feet,' said Jamil. And so his absent-mindedness was discovered, for all that he had two hearts."

Al-Suhayli said: "Jamil ibn Ma‘mar al-Jumahi was the son of Ma‘mar ibn Habib ibn Wahb ibn Hudhafa ibn Jumah—Jumah who was also called Taym. He claimed to have two hearts, and it was concerning him that the Qur’anic verse was revealed. He is also mentioned in this verse of poetry (meter: ṭawīl):

                How will I abide in Medina, after
                    Jamil ibn Ma‘mar seeks it no more?"

From al-Qurtubi's Comprehensive Judgments of the Quran

Enslaved men and blacksmiths in the poems of Jarīr

         al-Bayzār "Plowman" : The name of a slave
         Baghthar "Not Too Bright" : The name of a slave
         Thu‘āla "The Fox" : A slave of Mujāshi‘
         al-Jaythalūṭ [Unspecific term of abuse] : A slave
         Dāsim "Mindful Worker" : The name of a blacksmith
         Za‘‘āb "Bearer of Heavy Loads" : A blacksmith belonging to Ṣa‘ṣa‘a
         al-Zubbayyān (sic) [al-Waqbān?] :
               A slave belonging to [Ṣa‘ṣa‘a's mother] Qufayra
         Shuqār "Red" : The name of a slave
         Ibn Ṣam‘ā’ "Son of the Woman with Dainty Ears" : A freedman
         Ḍāṭir "Big Guy" : A slave
         Qunābir (sic) : A slave
         Masrūḥ "Easy-going" : A blacksmith belonging to
               Ṣa‘ṣa‘a and Qufayra
         Makḥūl "Sooty" : A slave belonging to Taym
         Hurmuz [A royal name of Persia deriving from Ahura Mazda]:
               A slave belonging to Qufayra

A prosopography by Dr. Nu‘mān Muḥammad Amīn Ṭāhā, editor of
Muḥammad ibn Ḥabīb's Commentary on the Collected Poems of Jarīr

More special feelings

Malik ibn Dinar, may God be pleased with him, said:

I set out as a pilgrim to the holy House of God, when I saw a young man walking on the road without food, water, or a mount. I greeted him, and my greeting was returned. "Young man, where are you from?" I asked him. He said, "From Him."
      "And where are you going?" I said. "To Him," he said. "And where are your provisions?" He said, "They're up to Him."
      "But you can't travel this road without carrying water," I told him. "Do you really have nothing on you?" "That's right," he said. "except five letters I brought with me when I set out." I asked him what these letters were, and he said, "God's word:"

كهيعص

(Kāf–hā–yā–‘ayn–ṣād)

"And what does it mean?" I asked.
      "Kāf is for the All-Sufficing (al-Kāfī)," he said, "and hā is for the Guide (al-Hādī). Yā is for the Refuge (al-Ma’wā), and ‘ayn is for the All-Knowing (al-‘Ālim). And ṣād is for the Keeper of Promises (al-Ṣādiq). Whoever keeps company with the All-Sufficient Guide, the Refuge, and the All-Knowing Keeper of Promises is not ruined, has nothing to fear, and has no need to carry food and water."
      Malik said: When I heard the young man's words, I stripped off my overshirt to dress him, which he declined. "Old man," he said, "it is better to go naked than wear the shirt of this world, whose lawful deeds are numbered, and whose unlawful ones will be punished. When the naked man is covered by the night, he can raise his face to heaven and say, 'O You, Who are gladdened by our obedient actions and unharmed by our disobedient ones, grant that I may always gladden You, and forgive my actions that do You no harm.'"
      When [we arrived at Mecca, and] the people readied themselves for purification and shouted Labbayka! I asked the young man, "Why do you not perform the ritual greeting?" He said, "I fear that if I say Labbayka, He will say, 'There is no labbayka, and no sa‘dayka, and I do not hear your words or look upon you.'" And with that, he departed. I did not see him again, except at Mina, where he was saying (meter: basīṭ):

My friends are pleased for my blood to be spilt.
    For them it's licit, in sacred months as in profane.
Just who is my spirit attached to? If she knew, by God
    she would stand on her head, and not her feet.
I say to my faultfinder: Leave my love for Him out.
    If you saw what I see in Him, you would not find fault.
There are some who circumambulate the House without moving a muscle,
    and they need no sacred precinct to do it in, by God.
When others celebrate Eid al-Adha, sacrificing things
    like sheep and goats, [God's true] lover sacrifices the lower self.
People have one pilgrimage, and I've got another, toward stillness.
    I lead forth my blood, my vital being, when sacrificial animals are led.

From The Garden of Aromatic Herbs of ‘Afif al-Din al-Yafi‘i.
(The poem is elsewhere ascribed to al-Hallaj)

Special feelings

Maymun al-Hadrami [legendary digger of a namesake well] said: I was about to make the pilgrimage when a woman I was chatting with told me:
     "Come and circumambulate my house seven times, the way they do the holy House. Run your camel there, and shave your head as pilgrims do. Fling stones at my nosy neighbor, the way they stone the Devil [at Mina], and then kiss me as they kiss the cornerstone."
      Maymun said: I did everything she told me. This is my poem about it (meter: basīṭ):

       I resolved to make the pilgrimage, but my heart
           had other plans. Beside the holy House I was intending,
       there was a woman's house, the house of Juml,
           and to her undraped house my steps conveyed me.
       My circumambulations lacked for nothing,
           all seven of them, as they do for God.
       And just as pilgrims vie to throw their pebbles,
           I threw mine at her neighbor with all my might.
       I was to shave my head
           and be made hairless,
       and run my camel as they do
          ’til his sores go down.
       Another of their rites is the kissing of the stone,
           but kissing you is nothing like a stone.
       If ‘Umar or ‘Uthman had been to your house
           their pilgrimage would be to you alone.

Maymun said: Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn Musa ibn ‘Imran al-Bakri said to me, "What induced you—God have mercy on you!—to leave out [the first caliph,] Abu Bakr, when you put ‘Umar and ‘Uthman in your poem?"
     "Because people have special feelings about Abu Bakr," I said. "May God have mercy on you as well."

From Reports that Are Agreed Upon by al-Zubayr ibn Bakkar

Two biters busted

Yunus the grammarian said: Ibn Abi Ishaq (d. 117/735) declared Islam's greatest poet to be Kuthayyir (d. 105/723), whose prestige and worth were conceded by the Quraysh. But Talha ibn ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Awf (d. 97 or 99/between 715 and 718) said:

I was with al-Farazdaq when he met Kuthayyir. He said, "O Abu Sakhr! [That is, Kuthayyir.] Of all the love poetry of the Arabs, yours is the best where you say" (meter: ṭawīl):

      I wish I could forget her. But everywhere
          I look, it's like Layla's there.

Kuthayyir responded, "O Abu Firas! [That is, al-Farazdaq.] Of all the Arabs' tribal boasting, yours is the best where you say" (meter: ṭawīl):

      We walk before other people, and they behind us.
          All we have to do is gesture, and they halt.

Talha said: Both verses are by Jamil. The first was ripped off by Kuthayyir, and the other by al-Farazdaq.
      Then al-Farazdaq said to Kuthayyir, "O Abu Sakhr! Did your mother used to come to Basra?" "No," said Kuthayyir, "but my father sure did."
      Talha said: Kuthayyir's comeback cracked me up. I never met anyone crazier than him. I was with a Qurashi group one time when we found him unwell. "How are you getting on?" we asked him. "Fine," he said. "Have you heard otherwise?" (Now Kuthayyir had Shi‘ite leanings.)
     "Yes," we said. "They say you're the Antichrist."
      Kuthayyir said, "By God, now that you mention it, I have been losing sight in one eye for the past few days!"

From the Commentary on the verses cited in the Summa of Ibn Hisham
by Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti; cf. the Book of Songs (1, 2)

If in Abu Dhabi

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