A translation of Antara

I reproach an age that does not bend to reproaching,
And plead for security from calamities approaching.

Promised by the days a promise that deceived me—
I know well it was but the promise of mendacity.

I served a people and took on relations
To aid me, and yet they became as scorpions.

— Antara,¹ I reproach an age (my translation of the first eight lines).

1. Antara was one of the great warrior-poets of pre-Islamic Arabia.