Qasida · 12th century

Get Down from Your Horse

Khaqaniخاقانی

این است همان صفه کز هیبت او بردی

This is that same dais where, in awe of it,

بر شیر فلک حمله شیر تن شادروان

the lion woven on its hangings would leap at the Lion in the sky.

پندار همان عهد است، از دیده فکرت بین!

Imagine it is that same age; look with the eye of thought:

در سلسله درگه، در کوکبه میدان

the chain hung at the gate, the cavalcade in the square.

از اسب پیاده شو، بر نطع زمین رخ نه

Get down from your horse, lay your face on the chessboard of the earth,

زیر پی پیلش بین شهمات شده نعمان

and see No’man checkmated under the foot of its elephant.

نی! نی! که چو نعمان بین پیل‌افکن شاهان را

No, no: see kings who felled elephants, like No’man,

پیلان شب و روزش کشته به پی دوران

slain by the elephants of its night and day under the foot of time.

ای بس شه پیل‌افکن کافکند به شه‌پیلی

Many a king who felled elephants has been thrown

شطرنجی تقدیرش در مات‌گه حرمان

by fate the chess player, with a king’s elephant, into the checkmate square of loss.

مست است زمین زیرا خورده‌ست به‌جای می

The earth is drunk, for in place of wine it has drunk,

در کاس سر هرمز، خون دل نوشروان

from the cup of Hormoz’s skull, the blood of Anushirvan’s heart.

بس پند که بود آنگه بر تاج سرش پیدا

Many a counsel was plain to see then on the crown upon his head;

صد پند نو است اکنون در مغز سرش پنهان

a hundred new counsels lie hidden now in the brain within his skull.

From: The Divan of Khaqani
Translation: Persiahaus Editors
Source: Draft translation from the Ganjoor text
Persian text: Ganjoor

A note for readers

A later passage of Khaqani’s qasida on the ruined Sasanian palace at Ctesiphon, called Mada’en in Persian, whose opening couplets are also on this site. The poet asks the traveller to dismount and picture the court in its glory, then turns to the kings it has outlived: No’man, the Arab king of Hira said to have been trampled by elephants at the Sasanian court, and the Sasanian kings Hormoz and Anushirvan. Chess runs through the passage: ‘lay your face’ (rokh neh) also means ‘set down your rook’, and the elephant is the chess piece as well as the beast.