1. O sailor in the night as dark as jet,
Be gentle, for my patience is patient yet.

2. You have not closed your eyelids, fraught with pain,
Since you made my eyelids ache in vain,

3. And my tears pour down like sudden rain,
In sudden rain.

4. And love has brought me bane,
Brought me bane!

5. O friend, my secrets and my bond lie bare,
Excuse me, but my plea is my despair.

6. I wish you well,
Not ill.

7. See, I'm appeased and healed,
If you are healed.

8. My guilt perhaps will thus be stilled,
Be stilled.

9. Why don't you seize your wage, so hard to gain?
And know my estrangement's like estrangement's pain.

10. Would he who brought me low
Uplift me now,

11. Or he who wrought me woe
Make peace! My wine is life itself to me.

12. My lips are castle keeps that shelter me.
Look on my state defiled!

13. My state!
I'm captive to your guile,

14. Your guile.
So hear my tale, beguiled

15. And pale.
Now the poetry calls,

16. It calls!
A poem decked in flowers like flowers bright,

17. Musk-scented, blooming in the blackest night.