[chiến địa hoàng hoa] [hoa thơm cỏ lạ] [sciure 'e arancio]
from the bursting
PODS OF COLOCYNTH
Stop, oh my friends,
let us pause to weep
over the remembrance of my beloved.
Here was her abode
on the edge of the sandy desert
between Dakhool and Howmal.

The traces of her encampment
are not wholly obliterated even now;
For when the South wind blows
the sand over them
the North wind sweeps it away.

The courtyards and enclosures
of the old home have become desolate;
The dung of the wild deer lies there
thick as the seeds of pepper.

On the morning of our separation
it was as if I stood
in the gardens of our tribe,
Amid the acacia-shrubs
where my eyes were blinded with tears
by the smart from the bursting pods of colocynth.

As I lament thus in the place made desolate,
my friends stop their camels;
They cry to me "Do not die of grief;
bear this sorrow patiently..."

Nay, the cure of my sorrow
must come from gushing tears.
Yet, is there any hope that
this desolation can bring me solace ?

So, before ever I met Unaizah,
did I mourn for two others;
My fate had been the same
with Ummul-Huwairith
and her neighbor Ummul-Rahab
in Masal.

Fair were they also,
diffusing the odor of musk
as they moved,
Like the soft zephyr
bringing with it
the scent of the clove.

Thus the tears flowed down
on my breast,
remembering days of love;
The tears wetted
even my sword-belt,
so tender was my love.

Behold how many pleasant days
have I spent with fair women;
Especially do I remember
the day at the pool
of Darat-i-Julju1.

On that day
I killed my riding camel
for food for the maidens:
How merry was
their dividing my camel's trappings
to be carried on their camels.

It is a wonder,
a riddle,
that the camel being saddled
was yet unsaddled!
A wonder also was the slaughterer,
so heedless of self
in his costly gift!

Then the maidens commenced throwing
the camel's fesh into the kettle;
The fat was woven with the lean
like loose fringes of white twisted silk...

On that day I entered the howdah,
the camel's howdah of Unaizah!
And she protested, saying,
"Woe to you,
you will force me to travel on foot."

She repulsed me,
while the howdah was swaying with us;
She said,
"You are galling my camel,
Oh Imru-ul-Quais,
so dismount."

Then I said,
"Drive him on!
Let his reins go loose,
while you turn to me.
Think not of the camel
and our weight on him.
Let us be happy."

"Many a beautiful woman
like you, Oh Unaizah,
have I visited at night;
I have won her thought to me,
even from her children
have I won her."

There was another day
when I walked with her
behind the sandhills,
But she put aside
my entreaties
and swore an oath
of virginity.

Oh, Unaizah,
gently, put aside some of this coquetry.
If you have, indeed,
made up your mind
to cut off friendship with me,
then do it kindly or gently.

Has anything deceived you about me,
that your love is killing, me,
And that verily
as often as you order my heart,
it will do what you order?

And if any one of my habits
has caused you annoyance,
Then put away
my heart from your heart,
and it will be put away.

And your two eyes
do not flow with tears,
except to strike me with arrows
in my broken heart.
Many a fair one,
whose tent can not be sought by others,
have I enjoyed playing with.

I passed by the sentries on watch near her,
and a people desirous of killing me;
If they could conceal my murder,
being unable to assail me openly.

I passed by these people at a time,
when the Pleiades appeared in the heavens,
As the appearance of the gems
in the spaces in the ornamented girdle,
set with pearls and gems.

Then she said to me,
"I swear by God,
you have no excuse for your wild life;
I cannot expect
that your erring habits
will ever be removed
from your nature."

I went out with her;
she walking,
and drawing behind us,
over our footmarks,
The skirts
of an embroidered woolen garment,
to erase the footprints.

Then when we had crossed
the enclosure of the tribe,
The middle of the open plain,
with its sandy undulations and sandllills,
we sought.

I drew the tow side-locks
of her head toward me;
and she leant toward me;
She was slender of waist,
and full in the ankle.

Thin-waisted,
white-skinned,
slender of body,
Her breast shining polished
like a mirror.

In complexion
she is like the first egg of the ostrich
--white, mixed with yellow.
Pure water,
unsullied by the descent of many people in it,
has nourished her.

She turns away,
and shows her smooth cheek,
forbidding with a glancing eye,
Like that of a wild animal,
with young,
in the desert of Wajrah.

And she shows
a neck like the neck of a white deer;
It is neither disproportionate
when she raises it,
nor unornamented.

And a perfect head of hair which, when loosened, adorns her back,
Black, very dark-colored, thick like a date-cluster on a heavily laden date-tree.

Her curls creep upward
to the top of her head;
And the plaits
are lost in the twisted hair,
and the hair falling loose.

And she meets me
with a slender waist,
thin as the twisted
leathern nose-rein of a camel.
Her form is like
the stem of a palm-tree
bending over from the weight
of its fruit.

In the morning,
when she wakes,
the particles of musk
are lying over her bed.
She sleeps much in the morning;
she does not need to gird
her waist with a working dress.

She gives with thin fingers,
not thick,
as if they were the worms
of the desert of Zabi,
In the evening
she brightens the darkness,
as if she were the light-tower
of a monk.

Toward one like her,
the wise man gazes incessantly,
lovingly.
She is well proportioned
in height
between the wearer of a long dress
and of a short frock.

The follies of men
cease with youth,
but my heart does not cease
to love you.
Many bitter counselors
have warned me of the disaster
of your love,
but I turned away from them.

Many a night
has let down its curtains around me
amid deep grief,
It has whelmed me as a wave of the sea to try me with sorrow.

Then I said to the night,
as slowly his huge bulk passed over me,
As his breast,
his loins,
his buttocks weighed on me
and then passed afar,

"Oh long night, dawn will come, but will be no brighter without my love.
You are a wonder, with stars held up as by ropes of hemp to a solid rock."

At other times,
I have filled
a leather water-bag of my people
and entered the desert,
And trod its empty wastes
while the wolf howled
like a gambler
whose family starves.

I said to the wolf,
"You gather as little wealth,
as little prosperity as I.
What either of us gains he gives away.
So do we remain thin."

Early in the morning,
while the birds were still nesting,
I mounted my steed.
Well-bred was he,
long-bodied,
outstripping the wild beasts in speed,

Swift to attack,
to flee,
to turn,
yet firm as a rock
swept down by the torrent,
Bay-colored,
and so smooth the saddle slips from him,
as the rain from a smooth stone,

Thin but full of life,
fire boils within him
like the snorting of a boiling kettle;
He continues at full gallop
when other horses are dragging their feet
in the dust for weariness.

A boy would be blown from his back,
and even the strong rider loses his garments.
Fast is my steed as a top
when a child has spun it well.

He has the flanks of a buck,
the legs of an ostrich,
and the gallop of a wolf.
From behind,
his thick tail hides the space between his thighs,
and almost sweeps the ground.

When he stands before the house,
his back looks like the huge grinding-stone there.
The blood of many leaders of herds is in him,
thick as the juice of henna in combed white hair.

As I rode him we saw a flock of wild sheep,
the ewes like maidens in long-trailing robes;
They turned for flight,
but already he had passed the leaders
before they could scatter.

He outran a bull and a cow and killed them both,
and they were made ready for cooking;
Yet he did not even sweat so as to need washing.

We returned at evening,
and the eye could scarcely realize his beauty
For, when gazing at one part,
the eye was drawn away
by the perfection of another part.

He stood all night
with his saddle and bridle on him,
He stood all night
while I gazed at him admiring,
and did not rest in his stable.

But come, my friends,
as we stand here mourning,
do you see the lightning ?
See its glittering,
like the flash of two moving hands,
amid the thick gathering clouds.

Its glory shines
like the lamps of a monk
when he has dipped their wicks thick in oil.
I sat down with my companions
and watched the lightning
and the coming storm.

So wide-spread was the rain
that its right end seemed over Quatan,
Yet we could see
its left end pouring down on Satar,
and beyond that over Yazbul.

So mighty was the storm
that it hurled upon their faces
the huge kanahbul trees,
The spray of it
drove the wild goats down
from the hills of Quanan.

In the gardens of Taimaa
not a date-tree was left standing,
Nor a building,
except those strengthened
with heavy stones.

The mountain,
at the first downpour of the rain,
looked like a giant of our people
draped in a striped cloak.
The peak of Mujaimir
in the flood and rush of debris
looked like a whirling spindle.

The clouds poured forth
their gift on the desert of Ghabeet,
till it blossomed
As though a Yemani merchant
were spreading out all the rich clothes
from his trunks,

As though the little birds
of the valley of Jiwaa
awakened in the morning
And burst forth in song
after a morning draught
of old, pure, spiced wine.

As though all the wild beasts
had been covered with sand and mud,
like the onion's root-bulbs.
They were drowned and lost
in the depths of the desert at evening.
("Mu`allaqat", The Hanged Poems - Imru'l-Qays)
Tên Việt: dưa hấu đắng
Tên Hoa: 柯羅辛(kha la tân)
Tên Anh: colocynth, bitter apple, wild gourd
Tên Pháp: coloquinte
Tên khoa học: Citrullus colocynthis (L.) Schrad.
Họ: Cucurbitaceae

© image Lytton John Musselman
Plants of the Bible - Old Dominion University
dưa hấu 西瓜(tây qua) Citrullus lanatus, C. vulgaris (watermelon)
辛 tân [bi4, mi3, pi1, xin1] 7(7/0), 8F9B bộ tân (辛) 1. Can tân, can thứ tám trong mười can. 2. Mùi cay. 3. Cay đắng nhọc nhằn. 4. Thương xót. Như bi tân 悲辛, tân toan 辛酸, v.v. 羅 la [sc: 罗][luo2] 19(5/14), 7F85 bộ võng (网) 1. Cái lưới đánh chim. 2. Là, một thứ dệt bằng tơ mỏng để mặc mát. 3. Bày vùng. Như la liệt 羅列 bày vòng quanh đầy cả. La bái 羅拜 xúm lại mà lạy. Bạch Cư Dị 白居易 : Bình sinh thân hữu, La bái cữu tiền 平生親友，羅拜柩前 bạn bè lúc còn sống, xúm lạy trước linh cữu. 4. Quày lưới để bắt chim. Vì thế nên chiêu tập được nhiều người tài đến với mình gọi là la trí 羅致. 5. La la 羅羅 thoáng, không đặc rít gọi là la la. [Tự Điển Thiều Chửu Online & CEDICT]
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