Sol 5.6

  1. Were you truly there, close beside me?

    Perhaps I am deluded, lost in illusion.

  2. Speak, O master of the heart,

    and tell me it was not a dream.

  3. You drew near to me, listening,

    so I confessed—and how much I confessed!—

  4. your distance and what it wrought,

    your desertion and all that I tasted,

  5. and my love—woe to it, my love!—

    which followed you wherever you were.

  6. Speak, O master of the heart,

    and tell me, by God: what are you?

  7. I see in the depths of your thoughts

    a majesty resembling the sea,

  8. and glimpse within your eyes

    the serenity of supreme mercy.

  9. You are my contentment, and you accept it;

    you are my consuming ache and my deprivation.

  10. In your eyes you slay that anguish,

    and in your smiles lies forgiveness.

  11. You are the dawn’s radiant smile,

    its smile upon the horizon;

  12. at times, the river’s moan,

    the sun’s sorrow at twilight.

  13. You are the warmth of the sun,

    and the bliss of the shade;

  14. you are the experiences of the past,

    and the innocence of a child.

  15. You are beauty, aloof and unattainable—

    its fortress defying the star.

  16. You are goodness gathered whole,

    and with you stands its loftiest throne.

  17. With you is all that awakened thirst;

    the heart came to drink, ardently yearning.

  18. With you is all that made the heart bleed

    and made the wound more grievous;

  19. with you is all that gave the heart life

    and strengthened its frail resolve.

  20. Your tenderness is the bloom of the world,

    and your nearness a blessing from God.

  21. Within it are the heart’s inward stirrings,

    and within it, the phantoms of my questioning.

  22. I love you with the holiest love;

    your love is my precious treasure.

  23. Your radiance is the prayer of my dreams,

    and this corner is my prayer niche.

  24. Within it I laid down my pains,

    and there cast off my afflictions.

  25. My passion, like magic, transformed me:

    I see with the shooting stars’ inspired vision.

  26. It purified me and granted me insight,

    and tore through the veils’ locked barrier.

  27. I soared, as though journeying onward

    toward a Lord who calls to me.

  28. Now my heart is no longer of the earth,

    nor is my body made of clay.

  29. I soared, and my perception grew subtle;

    I passed beyond the worlds of humankind.

  30. I forgot the petty faults of people;

    I forgave the injury dealt by fate.

Sol 5.6