1. What can he who is worn down by intense longing do
If tears fail to express his suffering when it wears him down?

2. O you who blame me for loving one I cannot abandon
How much anguish I conceal though it tears me apart

3. I profess my love though my soul clings to it
They said: "Leave love and its ways, o you"

4. Yet how many ardent lovers has it destroyed
I said: While yearning stirs the pain of separation

5. My heart disobeyed me when it possessed it
Others, alas, if only I could possess it

6. The clouds narrate the rain’s discourse about my eyelids
And the leaves echo the dirge of my anxiety

7. Ask him who slept ignoring my agony and burning pain
It would not hurt if he had let me keep but a breath

8. If he were to forgive the rest and leave it
Woe to my heart! Does it hope to attain union with its tormentor

9. And reach the beloved’s presence without needing to seek?
Away with what it wishes to avoid!

10. My craving for union, if only I could attain it
One cannot gain all that one wishes