One of al-Mutanabbi’s most peculiar lines of poetry is the one below:

ألمٌ ألَمَّ ألمْ أُلِمْ بِدَائِهِ *** إنْ انَّ آنٌ آنَ آنُ أَوَانه

If you look at it closely, you’ll see that each partial bayt is almost entirely composed of a single word… or so it seems!

This is what we get if we break it down for explanation:

ألمٌ – Pain
ألَمَّ – to hurt or surround in pain
ألمْ – not
أُلِمَّ – to know
بِدَائِهِ – its (cause of) illness

إنْ – If
انَّ – to cry or complain (of pain)
آنٌ – one who is in pain
آنَ – to arrive
آنُ – time
أَوَانه – its cure

So we get the following:

ألمٌ ألَمَّ ألمْ أُلِمَّ بِدَائِهِ *** إنْ انَّ آنٌ آنَ آنُ أَوَانه
“I have come to be surrounded by pain, the cause of which I do not know
If the one in pain cries out in agony, then the time for its cure has surely arrived.”

Phew! That was a bit of tongue-twister wasn’t it? A better suggestion of a translation is more than welcome; please write below in the comments section!