Labīd ibn Rabīʿah: The Bereaved Wild Cow, Rain and the Hunting Dogs (Verses 36–53)

1. A comparison becomes a full animal narrative

In the preceding passage Labīd portrayed his she-camel’s speed through wild asses. Afatilka am waḥshiyyatun masbūʿah opens another sustained comparison: a wild cow bereft of her calf, passing through rain, solitude, danger and an encounter with hunters.

The scene has three connected strands: maternal grief, the severity of nature and struggle for survival. The last verse returns to the she-camel, showing that the animal narrative functions within a larger simile.

2. A wild cow with a leader’s bearing

أَفَتِلْكَ أَمْ وَحْشِيَّةٌ مَسْبُوعَةٌ خَذَلَتْ وَهَادِيَةَ الصِّوَارِ قِوَامُهَا
Is the she-camel like a wild cow whose calf was taken by a beast, now separated from the herd though her bearing was that of its leader?

Masbūʿah describes an animal whose young has been taken by a predator; ṣiwār is a herd of wild cattle. Hādiyat al-ṣiwār is the cow that leads the herd.

The question with am shifts to a second comparison for the camel’s energy. It also introduces loss and danger, which drive the subsequent action.

3. Searching and lowing for the calf

خَنْسَاءُ ضَيَّعَتِ الْفَرِيرَ فَلَمْ يَرِمْ عُرْضَ الشَّقَائِقِ طَوْفُهَا وَبُغَامُهَا
She is a snub-nosed wild cow who has lost her calf; her circling and lowing among the rocky clefts do not cease.

Khansāʾ suggests a short or receding nose; farīr is the young calf; bughām a lowing or plaintive sound; and shaqāʾiq rocky clefts.

Lam yarim marks continuing non-cessation: she neither stops circling nor stops calling. Repetition of movement and voice conveys maternal distress.

4. The dust-covered calf and predators

لِمُعَفَّرٍ قَهْدٍ تَنَازَعَ شَلْوَهُ غُبْسٌ كَوَاسِبُ لَا يُمَنُّ طَعَامُهَا
She mourns a pale, dust-covered calf over whose remains greyish predators quarrel—creatures that do not receive their food as a gift.

Muʿaffar means dust-covered, qahd light-colored, and shalw remains of a body. Ghubsun kawāsib describes dusky predators that find food through hunting.

Lā yumannu ṭaʿāmuhā does not describe the animals as generous or ungenerous: it means their food is not bestowed on them. The cause of the calf’s loss is now made explicit.

5. Death’s arrows never miss

صَادَفْنَ مِنْهَا غِرَّةً فَأَصَبْنَهَا إِنَّ الْمَنَايَا لَا تَطِيشُ سِهَامُهَا
The predators caught her unawares and struck; indeed, death’s arrows do not miss their mark.

Ghirrah is an unguarded moment. The feminine plural verb ṣādafna returns to the predators of the previous verse. Their attack leads to a general statement.

Death’s arrows do not stray gives death the attributes of an unfailing archer. The poet rises from a specific incident to a universal maxim.

6. Lexical relationships: calf, predator and grief

ExpressionSense in the passagemasbūʿahwhose young was taken by a beastfarīrcalfshalwremains of a bodyghubs kawāsibdusky animals that hunt their foodbughāmthe mother’s plaintive cry

The words combine into a meaningful sequence: loss → search → predators’ feeding → the certainty of death. Their force emerges from their relationships within the scene.

7. A night of steady rain

بَاتَتْ وَأَسْبَلَ وَاكِفٌ مِنْ دِيمَةٍ يُرْوِي الْخَمَائِلَ دَائِمًا تَسْجَامُهَا
She spent the night as steady rain poured down, its unbroken flow soaking the sandy hollows and vegetation.

Dīmah is steady rain, wākif something that pours, and tasjām continuous flow. Khamāʾil evokes sandy hollows with vegetation.

After the loss of her calf, the cow must also endure the night’s weather. Rain is not ornamental background; it intensifies the ordeal.

8. Clouds conceal the stars

يَعْلُو طَرِيقَةَ مَتْنِهَا مُتَوَاتِرٌ فِي لَيْلَةٍ كَفَرَ النُّجُومَ غَمَامُهَا
Successive showers struck along her back in a night whose clouds concealed the stars.

Mutawātir means continuous or successive. In kafara al-nujūma ghamāmuhā, the verb kafara has the lexical sense of covering or concealing.

The rainfall against the animal’s back and the clouded sky together establish darkness and disorientation. The description is not a theological use of the verb.

9. Shelter under a solitary tree

تَجْتَافُ أَصْلًا قَالِصًا مُتَنَبِّذًا بِعُجُوبِ أَنْقَاءٍ يَمِيلُ هَيَامُهَا
She shelters in the hollow of a solitary, shrunken tree at the roots of sandhills, whose loose ridges slope and shift.

Tajtāfu suggests taking shelter within or behind something; aṣlan qāliṣan a shrunken tree trunk; mutanabbidhan isolated; and anqāʾ sandhills.

The shelter is weak: a diminished tree among unstable dunes. The setting reinforces vulnerability rather than genuine safety.

10. A pearl against the dark

وَتُضِيءُ فِي وَجْهِ الظَّلَامِ مُنِيرَةً كَجُمَانَةِ الْبَحْرِيِّ سُلَّ نِظَامُهَا
Against the darkness she shines like a sea pearl taken from its string.

Tuḍīʾu describes brightness. The image ka-jumānat al-baḥriyyi likens the pale animal to a sea pearl, sulla niẓāmuhā meaning removed from its string.

The “face of darkness” personifies night; against it the animal’s brightness becomes especially striking. The simile depends on contrast in color and visibility.

11. The visual design of rain, cloud and pearl

ImageNarrative effectdīmah / wākifpersistent stormkafara al-nujūmstars hidden by cloudaṣl qāliṣinadequate shelterjumānat al-baḥriyya bright, detached pearl

These images work together. The darkness outside contrasts with the visible pale animal, while the continuing rain intensifies her distress. The pearl simile is visually powerful precisely because the night is so dark.

12. Dawn and slippery ground

حَتَّى إِذَا انْحَسَرَ الظَّلَامُ وَأَسْفَرَتْ بَكَرَتْ تَزِلُّ عَنِ الثَّرَى أَزْلَامُهَا
When darkness receded and dawn appeared, she set off early, her limbs slipping on the wet ground.

Inḥasara means receded; asfarat describes dawn’s clearing; bakarat departing early. Tharā is moist ground, and azlāmuhā are her limbs.

The verbs form a sequence: darkness lifts, dawn comes, she sets off, then the wet soil causes slipping. Her motion remains energetic but troubled.

13. Seven days of restless searching

عَلِهَتْ تَرَدَّدُ فِي نِهَاءِ صَعَائِدٍ سَبْعًا تُؤَامًا كَامِلًا أَيَّامُهَا
Distraught, she wandered through rocky uplands and gullies for seven successive, complete days.

ʿAlihat implies agitation or bewilderment, nihāʾ hollows, and ṣaʿāʾid raised, rugged ground. Sabʿan tuʾāman refers to seven consecutive days.

The explicit duration turns a moment of sorrow into a prolonged search. The mother’s movement continues across contrasting types of terrain.

14. Despair and the depleted udder

حَتَّى إِذَا يَئِسَتْ وَأَسْحَقَ خَالِقٌ لَمْ يُبْلِهِ إِرْضَاعُهَا وَفِطَامُهَا
At last she despaired; her milk-giving udder had become slack and depleted through the loss, not through the ordinary cycle of suckling and weaning.

Yaʾisat means she despaired. Asḥaqa khāliqun depicts a depleted, slack udder. Irḍāʿ means suckling, and fiṭām weaning.

The physical change is tied to losing the calf rather than the normal passage from nursing to weaning. The poet makes grief visible through a bodily detail.

15. Grammar and morphology: seven days and weaning

FormAnalysisbakaratfeminine singular perfect: set off earlytazilluimperfect: slipsʿalihatfeminine singular perfect: became distraughtirḍāʿverbal noun of form IV: sucklingfiṭāmverbal noun: weaning

Ḥattā idhā marks a transition as one stage reaches its culmination and another begins. It structures the sequence in both verses 44 and 46.

16. Human voices from an unseen direction

فَتَوَجَّسَتْ رَزَّ الْأَنِيسِ فَرَاعَهَا عَنْ ظَهْرِ غَيْبٍ وَالْأَنِيسُ سَقَامُهَا
She caught the faint sound of people from an unseen direction and was frightened; humans were a source of peril to her.

Tawajjasat means she listened uneasily; razz al-anīs is a faint human sound; rāʿahā means it alarmed her. ʿAn ẓahri ghayb indicates a direction still unseen.

Al-anīs saqāmuhā presents humans as a danger to her. Sound comes before sight and creates suspense.

17. Fear in both directions

فَغَدَتْ كِلَا الْفَرْجَيْنِ تَحْسَبُ أَنَّهُ مَوْلَى الْمَخَافَةِ خَلْفَهَا وَأَمَامَهَا
She began to reckon both directions—behind her and ahead of her—as possible sources of danger.

Kilā al-farjayn means both openings or approaches; khalfahā wa-amāmahā clarifies: behind and in front.

The perceived threat has spread to every possible route. The hunters have not yet attacked, but the animal’s anticipation prepares the confrontation.

18. The hunters release their dogs

حَتَّى إِذَا يَئِسَ الرُّمَاةُ وَأَرْسَلُوا غُضْفًا دَوَاجِنَ قَافِلًا أَعْصَامُهَا
When the archers despaired of shooting her, they released trained, droop-eared hunting dogs, marked with their straps.

Rumāh are archers, ghuḍf droop-eared dogs, dawājin domesticated or trained animals, and aʿṣām their straps or markings.

The action shifts when archery fails and the dogs are sent in. The distant sound of humans becomes an immediate physical threat.

19. The horn compared to a lance

فَلَحِقْنَ وَاعْتَكَرَتْ لَهَا مَدْرِيَّةٌ كَالسَّمْهَرِيَّةِ حَدُّهَا وَتَمَامُهَا
The dogs caught up; she wheeled toward them with a horn whose sharp point and length resembled a fine lance.

Fa-laḥiqna means the dogs caught her; iʿtakarat depicts her turning to face them. Madriyyah is a horn; samharīyyah a straight, fine lance.

The comparison stresses both sharpness and length. The cow, earlier helpless in grief, now becomes an active defender.

20. A decision to fight for survival

لِتَذُودَهُنَّ وَأَيْقَنَتْ إِنْ لَمْ تَذُدْ أَنْ قَدْ أَحَمَّ مِنَ الْحُتُوفِ حِمَامُهَا
She fought to drive them off, certain that failure to resist would mean that her appointed death was near.

Tadhūduhunna means to drive the dogs away, ayqanat she became certain, aḥamma drew near, and ḥimām death.

In lam tadhud makes the condition explicit: without resistance, death will follow. Her combat is self-defense, not an attack for its own sake.

21. Kasāb and Sukhām: the outcome

فَتَقَصَّدَتْ مِنْهَا كَسَابِ فَضُرِّجَتْ بِدَمٍ وَغُودِرَ فِي الْمَكَرِّ سُخَامُهَا
She struck the dog named Kasāb, staining it with blood, while another, Sukhām, was left at the place of the encounter.

Kasāb and Sukhām are names of hunting dogs. Taqaṣṣadat suggests a directed blow, ḍurrijat bi-dam blood-stained, and ghūdira left behind.

Naming the animals and showing the bloodied outcome makes the encounter concrete rather than merely declaring the cow victorious.

22. Mirage veils and the return to the she-camel

فَبِتِلْكَ إِذْ رَقَصَ اللَّوَامِعُ بِالضُّحَى وَاجْتَابَ أَرْدِيَةَ السَّرَابِ إِكَامُهَا
Thus the she-camel is compared to that wild cow amid the shimmering heat of morning, when the hills seem clothed in veils of mirage.

Fa-bitilka returns from the extended comparison to the original she-camel. Lawāmiʿ are bright flashes, sarāb mirage, and ikām small hills.

In the hills put on the robes of mirage, the shimmering haze is clothing and the hills its wearers. This figurative landscape concludes the wild-cow comparison.

23. Grammar of the encounter with the hunting dogs

FormGrammar and sensetawajjasatform V, feminine perfect: listened apprehensivelykilā al-farjaynkilā means both; farjayn is genitive dualal-rumāhplural of rāmin: archersiʿtakaratturned to confront forcefullyli-tadhūdahunnapurpose particle plus subjunctive: in order to drive them awayḍurrijatpassive feminine perfect: was smeared with blood

The verbs build a clear progression: she heard → feared → hunters came → dogs were released → she turned → defended herself. Grammar supports the shift from bereavement to active confrontation.

24. The full narrative: from grief to defense

VersesMain development36–39calf lost, mother searching, mortality40–43rain, clouds, inadequate shelter, pearl image44–46seven-day search and despair47–49human voices and hunting dogs50–52self-defense and its outcome53return to the camel and the mirage

This is an extended narrative comparison. The cow’s vigorous movement and defensive agility illuminate qualities of the she-camel, while sound and landscape supply the scene’s texture.

25. Grammar, rhetoric and the next transition

ConstructionPointinna al-manāyā...emphatic maxim on deathkafara al-nujūma ghamāmuhāclouds covered the stars; lexical sense of kafaraka-jumānat al-baḥriyysimile introduced by ka-in lam tadhudconditional clause on self-defenseardiyat al-sarābmirage treated as a garment

Verses 36–53 complete this animal comparison. The next verse, Aqḍī al-lubānata lā ufarriṭu rībah, turns to Labīd’s personal resolve and marks a distinct new subject.