English
Section 9: The Four Unseen Things
The messenger arrived swift as the wind, told what he had heard and delivered the letter.
Alexander said to the messenger: Go back, return to that famous king.
Tell him: What is that thing in the world that no one has seen, whether open or hidden,
for people have already witnessed all that will ever be, and the sphere of creation will add nothing more?
The messenger came before the king, crossing the road as fast as fire.
He said to Kayd: These four things that no one in the world has ever possessed,
the king wishes to know what they are, since a thing unseen is not therefore nonexistent.
When Kayd heard this from the foreign envoy, he cleared the room and sat with his counselor.
They seated the messenger before them and honored him warmly in every way.
Then the king said to the messenger: I have a daughter kept in seclusion,
so lovely that if the high sun saw her, its own face would darken before her radiance.
Her hair is a lasso, black as pitch, and from her lips comes the scent of milk.
The cypress bends low before her stature, and roses scatter when she speaks.
Words cannot capture her face and beauty; the mind can only nurture the tale of her.
When silent, her soul is pure modesty and nothing else; no one in this age has seen her like.
She is of noble, commanding lineage and worships God, holding modesty and restraint in her hands.
I also have a cup that you may fill, or pour fresh water into it,
and if a man sits drinking with his companions for ten years, the wine in that cup never grows less.
The cup keeps giving both wine and cool water; the wonder is that no amount of drinking depletes it.
Third, I have a skilled physician who names the illness the moment he sees a single tear.
If he stands beside the king for years, the world ruling monarch will never suffer from any ailment.
The fourth I keep hidden from the assembly: a philosopher who lives close by me.
He tells the king all that is to come, from the turning sun to the shining moon.
The famous messenger turned back, his horse's hooves racing the wind.
He came and told it all before Alexander, and the world king's heart bloomed like a flower.
He said to him: If this account is true, these four things give the whole world its worth.
If he sends these to me, my darkened soul will grow bright.
I will not trample his land and country underfoot; for this goodness I will turn back to my place.