وفي ترجمته للبيتين الثاني والثالث يقول بولك:

" Given life by the spring rains of the stars and smitten

By the blows of the thunderheads, both the downpour and the drizzle.

From every unseen evening-travelling one and day-travelling

Cloud that darkens the day

And night voyager, the rumbling of thunder answers

One another." (1)

تلك كانت الترجمة، أما ما جاء في الهامش فحدث ولا حرج. يقول في حاشية البيتين السابقين:

" In Bedouin Arabic, the word rabia means both "spring" and "pasture". The rains come during the spring months when the stars of the Zodiac are in proper configuration; spring does not correspond to the Arab lunar year, and consequently Bedouin believed that the stars brought the rain.

As Charles Doughty wrote," rabia, or new spring of sweet blossoming herbage ... is the yearly refreshment, nay, the life, of the nomads' cattle. Delightful to the eye, in the desert land, was that poor faery garden of blossoms" (Arabia Deserta ﴿London, 1923﴾, 1:218). But due to the harsh climate of Arabia, spring does not come every year.

Drought often lasts several years. So spring, when it comes, is more than a season: it is a feast of the Gods. Wilfred Thesiger found in his travels in southern Arabia that "the Bedu have no certainty of spring. Often there is no rain, and even if there is, it may fall at any time of the year. Generally