Study

5. Lover

    Friends

   Eat, friends, and drink;
   drink your fill of love.

    She

    ² I slept but my heart was awake.
   Listen! My beloved is knocking:
“Open to me, my sister, my darling,
   my dove, my flawless one.
My head is drenched with dew,
   my hair with the dampness of the night.”
³ I have taken off my robe—
   must I put it on again?
I have washed my feet—
   must I soil them again?
⁴ My beloved thrust his hand through the latch-opening;
   my heart began to pound for him.
⁵ I arose to open for my beloved,
   and my hands dripped with myrrh,
my fingers with flowing myrrh,
   on the handles of the bolt.
⁶ I opened for my beloved,
   but my beloved had left; he was gone.
   My heart sank at his departure. Or heart had gone out to him when he spoke
I looked for him but did not find him.
   I called him but he did not answer.
⁷ The watchmen found me
   as they made their rounds in the city.
They beat me, they bruised me;
   they took away my cloak,
   those watchmen of the walls!
⁸ Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you—
   if you find my beloved,
what will you tell him?
   Tell him I am faint with love.

    Friends

    ⁹ How is your beloved better than others,
   most beautiful of women?
How is your beloved better than others,
   that you so charge us?

    She

    ¹⁰ My beloved is radiant and ruddy,
   outstanding among ten thousand.
¹¹ His head is purest gold;
   his hair is wavy
   and black as a raven.
¹² His eyes are like doves
   by the water streams,
washed in milk,
   mounted like jewels.
¹³ His cheeks are like beds of spice
   yielding perfume.
His lips are like lilies
   dripping with myrrh.
¹⁴ His arms are rods of gold
   set with topaz.
His body is like polished ivory
   decorated with lapis lazuli.
¹⁵ His legs are pillars of marble
   set on bases of pure gold.
His appearance is like Lebanon,
   choice as its cedars.
¹⁶ His mouth is sweetness itself;
   he is altogether lovely.
This is my beloved, this is my friend,
   daughters of Jerusalem.