1. O maidens of beauty, love, and dreams
Nay, o splendor of this existence

2. We have seen tresses cascading
Crowned by the morn’s bouquet

3. And we have seen eyelids smile or dream
Of light, love, and song

4. And we have seen cheeks blushed by magic
Ah, the spell of those cheeks

5. And we have seen lips smile, revealing
A world of tender, vermillion roses

6. And we have seen breasts sway like flowers
In the bliss of happy youth

7. An allurement that awakens love and flames it
But what lies behind those breasts?

8. What is there, behind her dreamy, drunk magic
In that distant hearth?

9. Beautiful souls like forest birds
Sing with enchanting melody

10. Pure like the most fragrant flowers
In the springtime just born

11. And shining hearts like night stars
Fluttering like tender petals

12. Or darkness as if pieces of the night
And terror that makes a babe gray haired

13. And a tumult surging with sin, loathing
Evil, and lingering shadows

14. I do not know, for many a fragrant bloom
Though fair, is lethal poison

15. May God protect you from the soul’s darkness
And from the conscience’s deviance

16. The night of souls is a dreadful night
Eternally sorrowful, vilely immortal

17. The heart writhing with bitter pain
And a wretched life of gloom

18. And the springtime of youth is worn by time
And its worshipped beauty passes

19. Naught lasts in existence but the beauty
Of the soul, forever young beyond all ages