Sol 5.6

  1. How grievously you have wronged me, O aloof beauty!

    How long you have prolonged your coldness toward the forsaken lover.

  2. Do not frighten him: what he already suffers is enough—

    moaning, burning anguish, and sighs.

  3. He finds a lifetime spent loving you too short,

    while the season of your rejection is anything but short:

  4. nights that pass like years,

    and months that pass like ages.

  5. Standing in their darkness, he awaits the dawn and casts—

    —at the night a torrent of tears.

  6. The stars almost plunge whenever

    he pours out his complaint before the All-Knowing, the All-Powerful.

  7. They frolic in the Milky Way like the hou—

    —ris, keeping one another company in the waters of a pool.

  8. His heart betrayed him, and he spent the night distraught;

    the heart of a lover is never patient.

  9. Yet once, in loving you, he was proud and mighty,

    too lofty to yield before the wide-eyed gazelles—

  10. king of love, of ardent yearning, and of long—

    —ing; lord of the palace hall, lord of the throne,

  11. above Khosrow and Caesar in king—

    —ship, and above al-Rashid and al-Mansur.

  12. Whenever he wished, he lodged the full moon in a palace;

    and whenever he wished, he dwelt among full moons.

  13. Gazelles passed him from one to another with their glances,

    gentle toward that guileless gazelle.

  14. They lodged him in their hearts, until they saw him

    swaying proudly there, within their hearts.

  15. They wept together when he departed, lovesick,

    so that he walked upon scattered pearls.

  16. So deal gently with my very soul, O king:

    love for you has kindled within it the fire of Hell.

  17. Indeed, the ordeal of your estrangement, though pro—

    —longed, is no hardship for your lover.

Sol 5.6