1. Happiness is but a promise unfulfilled
Do not hope to attain it through toil

2. Can you stand firmly on its waves
While you waver between elation and gloom

3. You yearn for it, but when you seize it
You spurn it, though once esteemed

4. Thus a beauty in the market entices
Men with her glances and grace

5. But when she sheds her clothes and stands
Naked, you say she deceived with display

6. Gone are her breasts and hips
Those charms are from a draper's store

7. Her fat is padding, and her palms
Are soft from a glover's leather

8. So too ugliness is masked in ornament
Meet it with a razor and plane

9. And be wise and strong in your will
Not helpless and led by command

10. See how birds vary, and the weakest
Is prey to the mightiest, and victory is for the hunter

11. The earth bears the ruled and the ruler
And above it the invader and the invaded are not equal