The damsel rejoiced, when the old man returned to her with the lute, and taking it from him, tuned its strings and sang the following verses:
After your loss, nor trace of me nor vestige would remain, Did
not the hope of union some whit my strength sustain.
Ye're gone and desolated by your absence is the world: Requital,
ay, or substitute to seek for you 'twere vain.
Ye, of your strength, have burdened me, upon my weakliness, With
burdens not to be endured of mountain nor of plain.
When from your land the breeze I scent that cometh, as I were A
reveller bemused with wine, to lose my wits I'm fain.
Love no light matter is, O folk, nor are the woe and care And
blame a little thing to brook that unto it pertain.
I wander seeking East and West for you, and every time Unto a
camp I come, I'm told, "They've fared away again."
My friends have not accustomed me to rigour; for, of old, When I
forsook them, they to seek accord did not disdain.
When she had made an end of her song, she wept sore, till presently sleep overcame her and she slept.
On the morrow, she said to the old man, "Get thee to the money-changer and fetch me the ordinary." So he repaired to the money-changer and delivered him the message, whereupon he made ready meat and drink, as of his wont, [with which the old man returned to the damsel and they ate till they had enough. When she had eaten,] she sought of him wine and he went to the Jew and fetched it. Then they sat down and drank; and when she grew drunken, she took the lute and smiting it, fell a-singing and chanted the following verses:
How long shall I thus question my heart that's drowned in woe?
I'm mute for my complaining; but tears speak, as they flow.
They have forbid their image to visit me in sleep; So even my
nightly phantom forsaketh me, heigho!
And when she had made an end of her song, she wept sore.
All this time, the young Damascene was hearkening, and whiles he likened her voice to that of his slave-girl and whiles he put away from him this thought, and the damsel had no whit of knowledge of him. Then she broke out again into song and chanted the following verses:
"Forget him," quoth my censurers, "forget him; what is he?" "If I
forget him, ne'er may God," quoth I, "remember me!"
Now God forbid a slave forget his liege lord's love! And how Of
all things in the world should I forget the love of thee?
Pardon of God for everything I crave, except thy love, For on the
day of meeting Him, that will my good deed be.
Then she drank three cups and filling the old man other three, sang the following verses:
His love he'd have hid, but his tears denounced him to the spy,
For the heat of a red-hot coal that 'twixt his ribs did lie.
Suppose for distraction he seek in the Spring and its blooms one
day, The face of his loved one holds the only Spring for his
eye.
O blamer of me for the love of him who denieth his grace, Which
be the delightsome of things, but those which the people
deny?
A sun [is my love;] but his heat in mine entrails still rageth,
concealed; A moon, in the hearts of the folk he riseth, and
not in the sky.