1. Many a night with laughing stars
Like the dreams of a maiden in her youth

2. The finger of tranquility touched my inner anguish
So it fled in fright from its abhorrence

3. Like a caged bird seeking liberation
Before captivity could corrupt its warbling

4. Sleep evaded me, so I went to the river
With a soul almost pouring out its blood

5. And with me a delicate companion
Whose vision the soul finds in its own vision

6. If a night darkens I see you illuminate it
Or a flower withers I see you give it fragrance

7.
He said, “How beautiful are the planets!”

8. I said, “How sweet is their radiance!”
He said, “Without longing or infatuation...”

9. So I murmured, “Without her...”
He said, “Do you wish to reach them?”

10. I said, “I wish nothing but her.”
My eyes roamed the lofty universe

11. And my soul roamed in its melody
And my companion thought I eyed the stars

12. While I deemed him oblivious of her
He said, “How many passions has the river seen flow?”

13. I bowed my head to probe its waters
And there I saw the shiver of my soul

14. Whenever the echo of her mention rippled in it
He said, “The night...” I said, “You have helped

15. My soul find solace, and my soul sufficed with its darkness.”
So we fell silent, each soul plunged

16. In its own whispered longings.
I felt that when far from her I'd forget her

17. And time would fold away the days of passion.
I imagined I would find a thousand Lailas, a thousand Hinds apart from her.

18. But love is like space, and my heart a bird
Lost in space, astray without her.

19. I'm in a distant, desolate world--
I cannot see her, but my soul sees her.

20. I have inhaled the scent of flowers in every land.
Their fragrance is not like her fragrance.

21. How to forget, when wherever I wander in the world
I find myself a captive in her world?

22. And when I glimpse a beauty on earth
It's as if I glimpsed her—her alone.

23. And when the breeze plays with my cloak
I say, “She has taught it this gesture of hands.”

24. She is nearer than longing to my heart
And my heart cries out, “How remote she still is!”

25. I do not complain of the torment of exile
But the soul's turmoil at being unable to unburden itself.

26. He said, “Some say love is sin.”
Pity the souls who are so ignorant!

27. A soul that love has never illuminated
Is a soul that knows not what love means.

28. They frightened me with hell and damnation.
What is hell and damnation?

29. For one who loves, God has no fire.
And the only fire I fear is my own.

30. Through love I have reached myself
And through love I have come to know God.