Song of Songs

10 [She] He is bright, my beloved, he is blooming; you would know him among ten 11 thousand. His face glows like gold, fine gold, his hair in locks like palm-flowers, 12 raven black. Yet his eyes are like doves, drinking at springs, washed in milk, at 13. rest by the well. His cheeks are like beds of balsam, where perfume herbs are 14 grown. His lips smell like lilies, flowing with myrrh oil. His arms are like golden bars, set with beryl stones. His stomach is hewn like solid ivory, inlaid with lapis 15 lazuli. His legs stand firm as marble pillars, fixed on gold foundations. Seeing 16 him is like looking at Lebanon, and he is as choice as its cedars. His mouth is filled with sweetness, for all of him, my longing. This is my beloved, this is my love, daughters of Jerusalem. 61 [Friends] Where has your beloved gone, most beautiful of women? Where has your beloved turned? We shall search for him with you. 2 [She] My beloved has gone to his garden, down to the beds of balsam; to pasture 3 in the gardens, to gather in lilies. am my beloved’s - my beloved is my own, who pastures among the lilies. 4 [He] My love, you are as beautiful as Tirzah, as lovely as Jerusalem, terrifying 5 as the flagged armies. Turn your eyes from me, for they have overwhelmed me. 6 Your hair is like a flock of goats streaming down from Gilead. Your teeth are like a flock of ewes rising up from cleaning; each bears twins, two and two, not one 7 among them lost. Your forehead, like a pomegranate, glows through your tresses. 8 Queens there are sixty; eighty concubines, and maids there are without number. 9 But my dove, my perfection, is one; one, unique to her mother — the shining one she bore. Look at her, you girls, acknowledge she is blessed; look, queens and concubines - and praise her.” 10 [Friends] Who is this, gazing out like morning, beautiful as the moon, shining like the sun, terrifying as the flagged armies? 11 [He] I went down to the nut-garden, to see the plants of the stream; to see whether the vines were in flower, and if the pomegranate buds had burst. 12, [She] 1 did not know myself - I found myself - amid the chariots of my princely people. 71 [Friends] Turn, turn back, Shulamite girl; turn back, turn, let us see you. [He] Why do you gaze at the Shulamite girl as if she were a Mahanaim dancer? 2 How lovely are your steps in sandals, prince’s daughter, the turn of your thighs 3 like jewelry, work of the artist’s hands; your navel a circular bowl — may it never 4 lack wine; your waist curved like baled wheat, bounded round with lilies. Your 5S two breasts are like young twins of a she-gazelle; your neck an ivory tower, your eyes like pools in Heshbon, like pools by the Bat Rabbim Gate; your nose like 6 the Tower of Lebanon gazing out to Damascus. Your head rises from you like the 7 Carmel, its curls shine like purple silk — a king is tangled up in its tresses. How 8 beautiful you are, how good; my love, in all its joys. Your bearing is like a date