His kunyah (teknonym) was Abū Bakr al-Anbarī. He was a poet, a person who wrote elegant and beautiful poetry with strong literary skill. One of his poems is as follows:
“I looked at time and the people of time, and that sufficed me. I came to know time and the people of time. I also understood whether I was lofty or lowly. Therefore, I distanced the friend from myself. Now neither does he see me nor do I see him. I cut off my connection with the things in his possession. I no longer hope for the things in his possession. They were amazed at the strong and victorious man.
He gave and gifted the near and the distant.
He slipped away from among hardships.
But victory does not come into his hand a second time.”
Ibn al-Jawzī said: “Muḥammad b. ʿUmar was a mutasawwif (Sufi). Then he separated from the mutasawwifs and cut off his connection with them. With some qaṣīdas (odes) that I narrated in the book Talbīs al-Iblīs (The Devil’s Deception), he criticized them.”
Muḥammad b. ʿUmar passed away on Thursday, the twelfth of Jumādā al-Awwal of this year.