diff --git a/qemu-timer.c b/qemu-timer.c
index 00a5d35c3f..c77de64301 100644
--- a/qemu-timer.c
+++ b/qemu-timer.c
@@ -314,7 +314,14 @@ int qemu_poll_ns(GPollFD *fds, guint nfds, int64_t timeout)
         return ppoll((struct pollfd *)fds, nfds, NULL, NULL);
     } else {
         struct timespec ts;
-        ts.tv_sec = timeout / 1000000000LL;
+        int64_t tvsec = timeout / 1000000000LL;
+        /* Avoid possibly overflowing and specifying a negative number of
+         * seconds, which would turn a very long timeout into a busy-wait.
+         */
+        if (tvsec > (int64_t)INT32_MAX) {
+            tvsec = INT32_MAX;
+        }
+        ts.tv_sec = tvsec;
         ts.tv_nsec = timeout % 1000000000LL;
         return ppoll((struct pollfd *)fds, nfds, &ts, NULL);
     }