1. The lover's weakness for passion is proof enough,
A frailty not open to interpretation.

2. Had he not been utterly smitten with beauty,
He would not convey the revelation and recitation.

3. He suffers her indifference, the singer,
And seeks from her the path to union.

4. O my heart, why persist in this passion?
It has melted you, diminishing your strength.

5. The heart replied: I disobeyed your command since I yielded
To love - I do not attempt change.

6. I will not desist, by God, even if you rebuke me
And recite to me the Torah and the Gospel.

7. How can escape be intended from the bondage of love
When I give precedence to obeying its commands?

8. I and the one who created mankind am pouring passion.
I will not see from my love any deviation.

9. An enchantress who captures minds when she sings,
A seductress who has set out to lead us astray.

10. She draws near then recoils like a fawn flirting
And glides down from the pillows of her eyelids smoothly.

11. She has mounted me into every hardship of love,
And I have yielded to her from my flowing tears.

12. My soul is hers for ransom, Ghada has learned
Me in passion - its composition and analysis.

13. She has captivated me, the poetry of David extolling her,
A raincloud from the House of Israel.

14. I go astray only in the wondrous beauty of her visage
And I see my guidance without her as futility.

15. Never, by God, will I forget she who passed
By the lofty abode of Michael.

16. Good fortune and happiness when her beauty shone forth
Vanquishing misfortune and chanting praise.

17. Her totality, proportioned with refinement the likes of which,
You would think, heavily ornamented.

18. With the beauty of her features and form
As though she faulted the making of Raphael.

19. I complain to her of my pain and my love sickness
And say: Frigidity from you is not beautiful.

20. I called out to her phantom, that it might gather, but it found naught -
Far be it from her phantom to be stingy!

21. O sun of lovely splendor rising for our minds
Dispelling uncertainty and ratiocination.

22. Lo, I have said your loveliness is lasting,
Meet it with a sanctum like the sanctum of the beloved.

23. So she smiled at my words as if she were
An angel eliciting praise and chanting.