1. I seek refuge in your rebuke, so hasten to help one who seeks refuge,
And open not a door to blame with eager haste,

2. For if you judge fairly one friendly with love
You make for him in what you suspect an escape,

3. I bid you beware lest fancy lead you blindly
To turn you from the paths of loyalty swerving,

4. For your glances have addressed me with falsehood
Veiling over it an inward fire surging,

5. I repent of the sin to which I was tempted
Though I was not thereby made to swerve,

6. Had that you fancied been no innovation
It is the rain-watered garden land flourishing,

7. Other than you the heart of man inclines from
And threads a path other than love pursuing,

8. You turned your love gently into my heart
So it came alive, a meadow of your watering,

9. And you stood by it, though far greater its merit
Murmuring over the back of manhood and caution,

10. Why then did the sea of love boil in change
When my pact with it was to still foes in flowing?

11. Naught disturbed me save a relaxation you folded
Wearily, as the fingers fold a letter,

12. I thirsted, and the distant one may thirst by springs,
And I met that sweetness from you oozing,

13. The howl of estrangement gleamed in me with joy
For which I lacked a shadow by your gate murmuring,

14. Does my firm love sometimes bend to a thought
Of blame that dawned, a face of excuse adorning?

15. Tomorrow composing among you necklaces of verse
And crowning nobles with them, embellishing,

16. Restrain one whose ribs passion’s fire has scorched
Though in the sea of concord he was plunging,

17. For he went bereft of solace as though
And you were protected from what strikes with madness,