1. He whom passion for you lays low
When overwhelmed by you utterly

2. The valiant, steadfast in adversity
If you turn from me, steadfast no more is he

3. O delight in the eye created
As joy for eyes that see

4. In me there is a blissful pain
Its secret, while I live, revealed shall not be

5. Save tears, when flowing turn
Toward my heart I sense them yearn

6. A kiss from you, my hope's extent
No, and from each devout and reverent

7. A hundred, nay, less than a hundred
God hates the exaggerated guess

8. Thousands upon thousands, I do not count them
Until the world's end, quench thirst they never can

9. If they say it is lewd, I see not
In the sincere lover any lewdness

10. I slept not the night, saw no
Rest for me, or leaving my bed

11. I sought solitude, wandering in
The small hours, their birds gone home to nest

12. As the gloaming its somberness adorned
And dawn prepared or beamed its best

13. I seek the wilderness of one close, and nothing
Of the waste, companioned, I disdain

14. Determined in flight from a pain
Ravaging my wings to rend and drain

15. When lo! a garden unveiled for me
Its keeper hailing me, bounding to see

16. The trilling of its songbirds wandering
Ever busy building nests anew

17. Among them a harmonious, gentle bard
Well-versed in lyrics, tuneful and true

18. Their pasture refined, their lilies
Most exquisite in their hues

19. Their ornaments embodied forms
Their decorations traced patterns too

20. A garden I visited, and in me burning
Like flame in tinder, or embers red

21. I tarried there seeking cure, but nothing
Came of it, the sickness in me spread

22. How fare I, with fire in my blood
When I look upon its shoots, lush and fed

23. For my eye, a garden well-watered
And my heart, all parched and dry instead