1. Do I give you good news, or is it water that washes and a garden in bloom?
Is it your memory, or is it a gentle breeze amid basil plants?

2. Otherwise why are my cheeks sunken, as if I were lovesick?
I've tossed and turned in my chill, as if I were troubled with anxiety.

3. Is it not just a collection of beauties
That vary in their sights and sounds?

4. With wisdom and eloquence like theirs
Problems get solved, sorrows get packed up.

5. And a necklace gets strung with the highest virtues,
Awards get handed out in the club of the proudest.

6. Words, as you’ve predicted, extremely excellent,
Where rubies were detailed, and coral was inlaid.

7. The water of natural talent flowed copiously in it,
Coming out refined, like silver purified by fire.

8. It came to me, radiating vitality,
As if, from the clouds, a thirsty one drank deep.

9. Babylon takes from it the craft of magic,
And the most cunning youth strives toward it.

10. In it, I found the scent of youth made gentle,
Without the tempest of adolescence, seasons go by.

11. Its breath rivals the apples of Lebanon,
While, alas, the land of the peninsula is far from Lebanon.

12. Will the teacher then accept from me a greeting
That travels like one drunk handed a flask?

13. At dawn, the garden of sorrow hastens toward it,
And the hero in his cloak leans toward it.

14. Lilac has undertaken to carry it, like an envoy,
Lilies have undertaken to bear it, like a palanquin.