Classic Poem

CANT. I.

S PONSA .

Join Thy life-breathing lips to mine;
Thy love excells the joy of wine.
Thy odours, O how redolent!
Attract me with their pleasing scent:
These, sweetly flowing from Thy Name,
Our virgins with desire inflame.
O draw me, my Belov'd, and we
With winged feet will follow Thee.
Thy longing spouse at length, Great King,
Into Thy royal chamber bring:
Then shall our souls, entranc'd with joy,
In Thy due praise their zeal employ;
Thy celebrated loves recite,
Which more than crowned cups delight.
Who truth and sacred justice prize,
To Thee their hearts shall sacrifice.
You daughters of Jerusalem,
You branches of that holy stem,
Though black, in favour I excel,
Black as the tents of Ismael,
Yet graceful, as the burnish'd throne
And ornaments of Solomon.
Despise not my discolour'd look:
This tawny from the sun I took.
My mother's sons envied my worth,
And, swoln with malice, thrust me forth
To keep their vines in heat of day,
While, ah, my own neglected lay.
More lov'd than all of human seed,
O tell me where Thy sheep do feed;
Where rest they, in what grateful shade,
When scorching beams the fields invade?
Why should I stray, and turn to those
Who are but Thy disguised foes?

S PONSUS .

O THOU , the fairest of thy kind!
I will inform thy troubled mind.
Follow the way My flock has led,
And in their steps securely tread;
Thy kids feed on the fruitful plains,
Besides the sheep-cotes of our swains.
Thou, love, art like those generous steeds
Which Pharaoh for his chariot breeds,
Trick'd in their rich caparisons.
How shine thy cheeks with sparkling stones,
Which loosely dangle from thine ears!
Thy neck the ocean's treasure wears.
I will a golden zone impart,
Enamelled with curious art.

S PONSA .

W HILE He the Prince of Bounty feasts,
And entertains His happy guests,
My spikenard shall perfume His hair,
Whose odour fills the ambient air.
All night His Sacred Head shall rest
Between the pillows of my breast.
Not myrrh, new-bleeding from the tree,
So acceptable is to me:
Nor camphire clusters when they blow,
Which in Engedi's vineyard grow.

S PONSUS .

T HY beauty, love, allures My sight.
And sheds a firmament of light.
In either eye there sits a dove,
So mild, so full of artless love!

S PONSA .

T HOU , my Belov'd, art fairer far;
Thou as the sun, I but a star.
Come, my Delight, our pregnant bed
Is with green buds and violets spread:
Our cedar roofs are richly gilt,
Our galleries of cypress built.