1. Why did you forbid our meeting,
My beloved, though longing afflicts me?

2. God has clothed him with beauty,
And filled his features with charm.

3. Perhaps he has turned from me -
No wonder if the branch should bend.

4. I say to him, crying with passion
In wonder, "Why this aloofness?"

5. Our separation fans the fire of my heart,
Leaving it to him, exposed to harm.

6. I ask his faithfulness, though I know
I attempt the impossible.

7. The water of beauty flows in him
Trickling from his features.

8. He wandered, exalted above his lovers,
Mixing coyness and charm.

9. From his eyelids flowed whiteness,
And his dark hair showed balance.

10. From between his lashes came magic
Explaining lawful witchery.

11. With his words he created perfection -
I know not if that was wine or words.

12. He walked, and I thought the moon walked,
He appeared, and his appearance was the crescent.

13. Touching charm, he shook a spear,
And with the softness of his glance, he shot arrows.

14. He smiled, and pearls shone from his mouth
With the brilliance of his beauty's hills.

15. His glance surprised his lovers with arrows,
After his conquest, ending the battle.

16. Think of this human being, and you will find
The ways of gazelles in him.

17. By his coquetry you witness the night,
And the sun's likeness in his cheeks.

18. May God protect him from the dangerous gazelle,
Who has grown tall before the brave lion.

19. His features have softened, but his heart
Has hardened, bringing me anguish.

20. I kept my love's promises to him
Until I deprived any but him from my imagination.

21. So he increased in remoteness and wandering,
Leaving me burning with anxiety and boredom.

22. Thus gazelles are startled without cause,
Fleeing in panic and alarm.

23. I reproach him but he does not understand rebuke,
I question him but he does not answer.

24. When he lengthened his distance and wandered in injustice and tyranny,
Though promising nearness, prolonging it,

25. I composed him as existence, and in purity
Left all else to the Exalted Creator.