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Or if thou’st lost thy love, like me, ah, then, indeed, Severance long-felt desire discovereth apace.
God guard a lover true! Though my bones rot, nor time Nor absence from my heart her image shall efface.
Then he fainted again and presently coming to his senses, went on to the second cage, wherein he found a ring-dove. When it saw him, it sang out, ‘O Eternal, I praise thee!’ and he sighed and recited these verses:
I heard a ring-dove say in her plaintive note, “Despite of my woes, O Eternal, I praise Thee still!”
And God, of His grace, reunion of our loves, in this my travel, may yet to us fulfil.
She visits me oft,[1] with her dusk-red honeyed lips, And lends to the passion within me an added thrill.
And I cry, whilst the fires in my tortured heart flame high And my soul for ardour consumes and my eyes distil
Tears that resemble blood and withouten cease Pour down on my wasted cheeks in many a rill,
There’s none created without affliction, and I Must bear with patience my tribulations, until
The hour of solace with her I love one day Unite me. Ah, then, by God His power and will,
In succouring lovers, I vow, I’ll spend my good, For they’re of my tribe and category still;
And eke from prison I’ll loose the birds, to boot, And leave, for joyance, the thought of every ill!
Then he went on to the third cage, in which was a mocking-bird. When it saw him, it set up a song, and he recited the following verses:
The mocking-bird delighteth me with his harmonious strain, As ’twere a lover’s voice that pines and wastes for love in vain.
Woe’s me for those that lovers be! How many a weary night, For love and anguish and desire, to waken they are fain!
’Twould seem as if they had no part in morning or in sleep, For all the stress of love and woe that holds their heart and brain.
When I became distraught for her I love and wistfulness Bound me in fetters strait, the tears from out mine eyes did rain
- ↑ i.e. in dreams.
