The Man Speaks to the Woman

4 How beautiful you are, my darling!

Oh, you are beautiful!

Your eyes behind your veil are like doves.

Your hair is like a flock of goats streaming down Mount Gilead.

2  Your teeth are white like newly sheared sheep

just coming from their bath.

Each one has a twin,

and none of them is missing.

3  Your lips are like red silk thread,

and your mouth is lovely.

Your cheeks behind your veil

are like slices of a pomegranate.

4  Your neck is like David’s tower,

built with rows of stones.

A thousand shields hang on its walls;

each shield belongs to a strong soldier.

5  Your breasts are like two fawns,

like twins of a gazelle,

feeding among the lilies.

6  Until the day dawns

and the shadows disappear,

I will go to that mountain of myrrh

and to that hill of incense.

7  My darling, everything about you is beautiful,

and there is nothing at all wrong with you.

8  Come with me from Lebanon, my bride.

Come with me from Lebanon,

from the top of Mount Amana,

from the tops of Mount Senir and Mount Hermon.

Come from the lions’ dens

and from the leopards’ hills.

9  My sister, my bride,

you have thrilled my heart;

you have thrilled my heart

with a glance of your eyes,

with one sparkle from your necklace.

10  Your love is so sweet, my sister, my bride.

Your love is better than wine,

and your perfume smells better than any spice.

11  My bride, your lips drip honey;

honey and milk are under your tongue.

Your clothes smell like the cedars of Lebanon.

12  My sister, my bride, you are like a garden locked up,

like a walled-in spring, a closed-up fountain.

13  Your limbs are like an orchard

of pomegranates with all the best fruit,

filled with flowers and nard,

14  nard and saffron, calamus, and cinnamon,

with trees of incense, myrrh, and aloes—

all the best spices.

15  You are like a garden fountain—

a well of fresh water

flowing down from the mountains of Lebanon.

The Woman Speaks

16  Awake, north wind.

Come, south wind.

Blow on my garden,

and let its sweet smells flow out.

Let my lover enter the garden

and eat its best fruits.