1. I have been afflicted with this love, bearing it alone,
While everyone has a lover, I have none but my agony.

2. She is beauty personified, and I am passion itself,
No lover was there before me, nor shall one come after me.

3. In every valley of passion there is vitality,
My state in Paris is like my state in Najd.

4. Never did I come to her one morning,
Feeble, without her breeze promising me nothing.

5. You were, and she was, while coquetry kept her away,
Revealing what I hid, hiding what I displayed.

6. I persisted until she hid a kiss from me
Cautiously, even from her ornaments and necklaces.

7. We were like flowers kissing one another,
The eagles silent on the lips of the roses.

8. My mouth was to her a missive,
Which she received through her mouth and charged with answering.

9. If my beloved does not confide in me,
Say, why cannot confiding be my lot?