Literary Liturgical Litany

Having been inspired by Thalia’s Blog Birthday post, I put together this litany for writers.  Its format follows the Great Litany of the Episcopal Church.  No disrespect is intended; rather, I hope that we all might seek the aid of the Author of Life as we set out to write.

O God the Father, whose name precedes all discussion of existence; who spoke all things that are into being; who orders the cosmos with a word,
Have mercy upon us.

O God the Son, the Word made flesh who dwelt among us; the author and perfecter of our faith; whose words will never pass away,
Have mercy upon us.

O God the Holy Spirit, who spoke by the prophets; who sunders speech and melds it anew into coherence; who intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express,
Have mercy upon us.

O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, one God, who has given the scriptures by inspiration for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness,
Have mercy upon us.

Remember not, Lord Christ, our first drafts, nor our long-disposed outlines; neither reward us according to our wordcraft.  Spare us, good Lord, spare thy creatures, for whom thou hast poured out the treasure of thy precious blood: the Word become flesh, the myth become fact, the sinless become sin for our sake.  By thy mercy preserve us, for ever.
Spare us, good Lord.

From all blindness of heart; from pride, vainglory, and hypocrisy; from envy, hatred, and malice; and from all want of charity,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From all false doctrine, heresy, and schism; from hardness of heart, and contempt of thy Word and commandment,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From tepidity of convictions and weakness of thought, reason, and diction,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From vacuity of substance and fatuous compositions,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From misuse of our time and distractions in our research; from antipathy for labor and the soul-weight of sloth,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From needless verbiage which obscures truth and sense,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From incorrect data, false testimony, skewed perspectives, incomplete citations, and misleading rhetoric,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From disorganized ideas; from overused tropes and clichéd plots; from plot holes and inconsistencies,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From paper-destroying fire and flood; from battery failure, power outages, viruses, frozen screens, unsaved documents, and all other complications,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From writer’s cramp and carpal tunnel syndrome; from smudged ink; from an illegible hand,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From poor grammar and careless editing; from conflation of similar terms and confusion of homophones; from the run-on sentence and typo,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From the evils of comma abuse, apostrophe neglect, and subject-verb disagreement,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From confusion of tense, voice, and mood,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From all kinds of aphasia and dullness of expression,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From unconstructive, vicious reviews; from careless readership,
Good Lord, deliver us.

From fear of honest writing and the perils of self-doubt,
Good Lord, deliver us.

In all instances of writer’s block; in all time of springing words; in the hour of editing, and in the day of publishing,
Good Lord, deliver us.

We writers do beseech thee to hear us, O Lord God; and that it may please thee to govern our hearts to glorify you in our writing,
We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

That it may please thee to illumine our minds as we put words to the page,
We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

That it may please thee to breathe into our spirits your life-giving word, and sustain us when fainting,
We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

That it may please thee to inspire us, in our several callings, to do the work which thou givest us to do with singleness of heart as thy servants, and for the common good,
We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

That it may please thee to grant that, in the fellowship of Francis de Sales and all the saints, we may attain to thy heavenly kingdom,
We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord.

Son of God, we beseech thee to hear us.
Son of God, we beseech thee to hear us.

O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world,
Have mercy upon us.

O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world,
Have mercy upon us.

O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world,
Grant us thy peace.

O Christ, hear us.
O Christ, hear us.

Kyrie eleison.
Christe eleison.
Kyrie eleison.

Let us pray.

We humbly beseech thee, O Father, mercifully to look upon our infirmities; and, for the glory of your Name, turn from us all those evils that we most justly have deserved; and grant that in all our troubles we may put our whole trust and confidence in thy mercy, and evermore serve thee in holiness and pureness of living, to thy honor and glory; through our only Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with us all evermore.
Amen.

Words, and Otherwords

I am doing some preliminary preparation for teaching a segment on poetry to my fifth graders.

The segment begins on Monday.

It will be a busy weekend.

But since my first goal is to teach them to enjoy poetry, I am scrambling to find a copy of Richard Wilbur’s Words Inside Words collection. Understandably – albeit sadly – no version is available online.

Instead, I did find a reading and animation of a few snippets, put forth by that eternally – entertaining TV station, PBS.

It is actually rather unnerving, but you can see what kind of fun things Wilbur did with words.  And poems.

 

 

 

 

Is your appetite whetted? For the sake of fostering Beauty and Truth, I give you . . . .

Richard Wilbur reading and commenting on “Love Calls Us to the Things of This World”!!!!!!

*swoons*

I pine.

I long.

My heart aches to find such expression of truth.

Obs. Conf. S.

Have a little cipher, friends, and a babbling brook of badness.  I don’t suppose it’s without reason you’ve only heard from Mel of late.

There was a month (give or take) where she fell really hard.  Hit back a good ten years, struck until she (like others before her) hid behind third person.  The stories, they grip her, she couldn’t say why.  It isn’t real, is it?  Not official.  But there are always more of them, effectively unending, even when she skips the ones that go nowhere.

Some miss the mark, character-wise.  Obviously wrong, a forgery a child could spot.  Off-putting.  Some aren’t obvious but by degrees veer off otherwhere, and she should be used to that (it is fiction after all)  (this is what fiction DOES [oh dear, much less force in the third person singular rather than plural (that’s what stories DO [much better])]) and yet and yet she cannot stop reading she cannot stop wanting something and for a while it seems these stories give her that and yet it becomes clear that they can’t.

The time is now 11:04 and that is longer than she meant but on the other hand, there’s still enough time to wash up the dishes, to sort through that pile of papers, time enough to put some clothes away.

Okay, so it was just after 11 but now it’s 11:42 and that is significantly closer to midnight but it’s not there yet.  She can do those things on the list after she finishes this bit.

Oh look, suddenly it’s 12:20.

Suddenly it’s 12:36 (barely half past, really)

it’s 12:49 (not 1 AM, she’s fine)

it’s 1:23 (if she wakes up at 7 precisely that will be 5 hours and 37 minutes of sleep which is surely enough to be getting on with when there’s coffee and nothing too demanding, right?)

it’s 1:54  (I should be in bed)

it’s 2:07 (and now, finally, she’s finished reading and it relinquishes its hold and her eyes are burning a bit and she won’t click on anything else she swears it after all you can’t possibly when you’re leaving out commas and full stops)

(and yet the apostrophes remain; she can’t figure that out)
(semicolons as well it seems)

Bed.  Overwarm.  Mind spins a bit, a top about to rock and tip over and skid to quietness.
It has been a long month.  Sometimes I can resist the urge.  But sometimes I sit and read; I can do no other.

God help me.  Amen.

Travelogue: The Miraculous Staircase

As part of the Epic Father-Daughter Road Trip, my Dad an I made several carefully selected detours.

The first stop was Santa Fe, for the sole, select purpose of seeing the Miraculous Staircase.

This staircase is something I first read about in Willa Cather’s gorgeous novelization of the first Bishop and eventual Archbishop of Santa Fe, Death Comes for the Archbishop.

For all the fictionalization in Cather’s book, (albeit sensitive, beautiful and poignant fictionalization,) her history was pretty exact.

The Bishop requested that missionary Nuns come build a convent and a girl’s school in Santa Fe; in 1852 the Sisters of Loretto responded, and by the 1870s their school had grown to house, feed, and educate 300 girls.

In 1873 the Sisters commissioned their own chapel, modeled after the famous Sainte Chappell in Paris. When it was finished in 1878 it was the first Gothic architecture built west of the Mississippi River, but it had a problem.

The builder had neglected to an account for staircase into the choir loft twenty-two feet above.

The chapel was too small to build a traditional staircase without decreasing the amount pew space by a third.

And a ladder was not a feasible option for Nuns. (With the whole seeing up skirts modesty issue.)

No carpenter, not even those brought from France, could find a solution.

Finally the Sisters began a novena, (a nine-day long prayer,) to St. Joseph. St. Joseph, in addition to being the foster-father of Jesus, is the patron saint of carpenters.

On the last day of the novena, a man appeared leading a donkey burdened with only a saw, a T-square, and tubs in which to soak the wood. He told the sister that he could solve their staircase problem.

For three months he locked himself in the chapel, and then, with the staircase having been finished, mysteriously disappeared without seeking payment.

The stair he built was in a spiral with two complete 360 turns.

He had not used any nails.

But most amazingly, the staircase has no support. The full weight of it rests upon the last step into the choir loft.

 

 

Given the helix shape and lack of connection to anything other than the slim piece of wood attached to the choir loft, the whole staircae ought to spring like a slinky. But it does not.

The stair was originally built without a banister, which was, as a sign said, “a daily act of faith” for the sisters and students. Ten years after construction the sisters hired a local carpenter to add the handrail.

Later years also added the support of that metal coil attached to the pillar. Otherwise the stairs are untouched.

 

 

Seen it up close, it looks as though the spiral should be built around a pole; there is space for a pole at the center. But there is no pole.

The wood bent around the interior of the spiral is thought to be the main support, because of the tight radius. But no modern replica can be made.

It is a feat of both engineering and carpentry, particularly given the simple tools that the mysterious carpenter used.

 

 

Most modern evaluations are skeptical not simply of the staircase’s maker, but of the safety of such a construction. They claim that by definition the structure is unsound.

As they will attempt to prove otherwise, we must look at the historical usage of the stair.

 

 

Hmm. What say you all now, oh scientists of skepticism?

The staircase and chapel are very beautiful, even if sadly no longer in the possession of the Church. In the wake of Vatican II the chapel was sold to a private family, and is now simply a tourist attraction.

It was painful to watch the tourists meander in and snap photos without seeming to notice anything anomalous about the staircase.

Even if one is suspicious of the origin or “miraculousness” of the staircase, the marvel of its design and construction ought to elicit some awe.

So if you are ever near Santa Fe, it is certainly worth a detour!

The Stars Are Shifting: Change is a Comin’

 

Yesterday, I received a “Back-to-School Sale” flier in the mail.

And I panicked.

Because although I have spent a good 19 years out of my 25 in school, this “Back-to School”  will be different.

This year, I will be teaching.

Yep.

And the Summer is almost over!

 

A week from today, my dad and I will begin a cross-country road trip to move me and all of my worldly goods to the California coast.

Three weeks from yesterday, I will begin Teacher In-Service, where I will presumably be told what a teacher does.

One month from tomorrow, I will greet my little Fifth Grade students, stand in front of a classroom, and teach.

 

I am excited.

Nervous.

Thrilled.

Terrified.

 

The moment I accepted the job, everyone began to tell me horror stories and overload me with “good” advice.

Example: “Never cry! They sense fear, and will NEVER respect you EVER again. And then they will make fun of you.”

It hadn’t even crossed my mind that I might cry. Do teachers cry in front of students? Whatever for?

As a homeschooled child, I am rather confused by the role of teachers to begin with. What exactly do they do? Just stand up front and talk? Don’t the books teach everything all ready? How do teachers organize time? Give assignments? What goes on in a typical classroom? How does one write on a blackboard?

When I was in school, I would read my chapter, do the assigned practice work, hand it to my mom to be graded, and move on to the next subject. Until High School, I was finished with all my work before lunchtime, and could spend the rest of the day reading.

In college, I transitioned to the lecture/group discussion/seminar learning style fairly easily.

But college level seminars do not seem to be applicable to Fifth Grade.

Fortunately, this school is a small, private academy, and they seem to really take care of their teachers. Already I have been sent various books on the practical management of classrooms, lesson plans, and basic life. And all the kids seem friendly and engaged.

 

So.

Step 1.) Build a Teacher Wardrobe. It IS all about the clothes. Thank Heaven for my friend/personal style guru V over at classroomlaundry. (Which is soon to morph into a Teacher Fashion Blog!)

Step 2.) Project Confidence.

Step 3.) Confidence.

Step 4.) CONFIDENCE!

 

I am leaving the graduate school environment, a wonderful community, good, good friends, and the comfort of my cozy apartment to go to California.

Which is, apparently, full of Californians. Who knew?

I’m scared.

And I am considering dying my hair blonde, in an effort to fit in. What do you think?

Actually, now that I think about it, some of my good friends are from California. The aforementioned V is, and so is David from The Warden’s Walk.

I will survive!

 

It will be a huge change for me, the shy, little, homeschooled Midwesterner, and full of many challenges and (I trust!) blessings.

Hopefully it will occasion many more amusing, insightful, delectable tales for me to tell here.

But if I disappear for a while, call for help and send me a bottle of emergency Scotch.

Thank you. You will be saving my life.

 

And pray that my first day does not look like this!

Sojourners in a Familiar Land

I got up early this morning.

5:30AM, to be exact. Which is four and a half hours earlier than I like to awake.

But I had faith that it would be worth the trouble.

Then I boarded a plane and took my place between two slightly odd people engrossed in their iPads. The lady to my right was reading a “supernatural mystery romance”, as she told me. The man to my left was more secretive, but from peering over his lap I deduced that his reading material was either a historical proof of Christ’s existence, or a refutation of a Neo-Platonist interpretation of Scripture.

And I, wedged between them, clutched my worn paperback of Dorothy Sayers and pretended that I was not resisting sleep.

But I held out the hope that such suffering would not go unrewarded.

My hopes were not unfounded:

My family greeted me when I landed.

Thus, today has been filled with wonderful, beautiful moments.

• Incessant hugs

Little sisters are amazing. They not only decorated the house for my homecoming, but they proceeded to clamp onto me and make sure I knew how much I was missed. We spent two and half hours frolicking in the pool before the employed siblings began to trickle home.

• Rain Dancing

No sooner were we dry from the pool, it began to rain. So I and the small ones ran into the driveway where we spun about and chased the steam rising off of the hot black top.

Then I dragged my fifteen year old brother, (brother #3,) out and proceeded to teach him the basics of swing dancing. In the rain. He was very obliging and sweet.

• Amazing Dinner

I always forget that my mother is not simply a great cook: she is a genius at matching the food to the weather. And in the hot, humid, pre-storm evening, we had a spinach, chicken, feta and strawberry salad, fruit salsa, and raisin muffins. With  homemade lemon sorbet as dessert.

It was to die for. Should I ever need a “Last Meal”, this would be it.

• Mojitos

My beautiful sister Calliope is taking bartending lessons. I had not known this. But this means she must practice almost every night.

Oh, darn.

• Discussion

Calliope and I sat on the porch after the rain dancing and had a beautiful sisterly rambling. She claims that she is no longer my baby sister. I disagree.

Over dinner the family  conversation ranged from Theological implications of the seven days of Creation to the intrinsic value of ice cream. and thunderstorms.

• Dates

I poked brother #2 until he agreed to take me on a date to the movies.

Then brother #1, the last sibling still distant, (he has to hike the Grand Canyon,  the jerk poor dear,) called and talked with me for thirty minutes with fraternal affection! I used have to work to get him to stay on the phone for two minutes!

It has been a wonderful first day back, full of comfort and adventure.

In fact, it reminds me of a passage from Chesterton’s Orthodoxy.

“I have often had a fancy for writing a romance about an English yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England under the impression that it was a new island in the South Seas. I always find, however, that I am either too busy or too lazy to write this fine work, so I may as well give it away for the purposes of philosophical illustration. There will probably be a general impression that the man who landed (armed to the teeth and talking by signs) to plant the British flag on that barbaric temple which turned out to be the Pavilion at Brighton, felt rather a fool. I am not here concerned to deny that he looked a fool. But if you imagine that he felt a fool, or at any rate that the sense of folly was his sole or his dominant emotion, then you have not studied with sufficient delicacy the rich romantic nature of the hero of this tale. His mistake was really a most enviable mistake; and he knew it, if he was the man I take him for. What could be more delightful than to have in the same few minutes all the fascinating terrors of going abroad combined with all the humane security of coming home again? What could be better than to have all the fun of discovering South Africa without the disgusting necessity of landing there? What could be more glorious than to brace one’s self up to discover New South Wales and then realize, with a gush of happy tears, that it was really old South Wales. This at least seems to me the main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of this book. How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour of being our own town?”

And this was feeling that overwhelms me on my homecoming. May all travels end so gloriously!

Mel’s Meme: Oh, Prisons of Finitude!

In my defence, I did not mean these memes to be quite as romantic as they sound. (Also, no one would help me make them up! You guys do it next time!)

Yes, I know, they sound ridiculously mushy. But I was trying to find specific, earthy examples of abstract, philosophical questions. And the questions that I do tend to lean on the side of are usually things like;

“Literature, the sharing of words, stories, and experience, presupposes a community in which to do the sharing. So, what role do books have in creating, fostering, and renewing community? What – if anything – do books have to do with being  Human? Being Human in a community? Love, or the need for another person, is the basic instinct that draws human being together into a community. Can books facilitate that function? How? Why? Which books?” ~Melpomene, Musings in the Witching Hour*

Ahem. Et cetera.

In this instance, what I was trying to question was not so much a problem of romantic love. Rather, I wanted to know if there were books so dear, so crucial, so formative to my own Being and understanding of the world that it would be impossible to share a life with another person without likewise sharing this work of literature.

Le sigh.

As usual, my scope is too wide and my example too narrow.

My sad choice of phrasing does place some practical limitations on this week’s challenge. I am quite sure there will be other things I will want to be doing on my Honeymoon. But as it is, I must carefully select a work that fosters this very select community of two, preferably with the opportunity for discussions, enjoyment of the words and story, and probably give some of the epic, sacramental scope of matrimonial love.

Heart of the World:
by Hans Urs Von Balthasar

This is a very beautiful, delicate, odd little book. (It is short, sweet, and can be picked up and put down easily. The reading it aloud only increases the delight. The perfect honeymoon book!) Von Balthasar is known as a theologian, but this book – even in translation! – marks him as a poet. Oh, it is written in prose form, but the exquisite sentences, graceful imagery, and meandering unfolding of ideas marks this a work of Poetry.

It feels like an old man musing on the nature of the world and the meaning of living (emphasis on the act of living, as well as the more abstract concept of life) and allowing his ideas to flow forth in the sweetest, most beautiful expressions possible. It is a work which invites the readers into contemplation, stillness, beauty, grace, and, (most deeply) love. This work has been describes as the ” pure serenity of a volcano under snow”. And as poetry, it shares the experience between souls, the most hidden and holy expressions of the Heart.

He begins by describing the drift in the River of Time, gently opening with the idea of the Self and the Other, the precious individuality that as yet leaves us each alone; ideas I have thought about, but for which I have never been able to find the proper articulation.

“Prisons of finitude!

Like every other being, man is born in many prison. Soul, body, thought, intuition, endeavor: everything about him has a limit, is itself tangible limitation; everything is a This and a That, different from other things and shunned by them. From  the grilled windows of the senses each person looks out to the alien things which he will never be . . .  How far it is from one being to its closest neighbor! And even if they love each other and wave to one another from island to island, even if they attempt to exchange solitudes and pretend they have unity, how much more painfully does disappointment then fall upon them when they touch invisible bars . . . Being are alien to one another, even if they do stand beautifully by one another and complement one another colors, like water and stone, like sun and fog: even if they do communally perfect the resounding harmony of the universe. Variegation pays the price of separation . . . The limpid mirror has been shattered . . . but every single splinter remains precious, and from each fragment there flashes a ray of the mystery of its origin.” ~ Chapter One: The Flowing Stream

And so he continues on, finding words fit to picture, at least in part, a mystery of the World. And the main image centering, (anchoring, cohering,) the book is the image of the cross as an embrace. The world as full of significance and meaning and tremendous splendor. The unity of beings is only possible in the Union of Christ to His bride, the Church. And this the example we have on which to model out marriages.

The second half of the book shifts slightly to address the church as the beloved bride, at the same time gracefully makes it clear that reader who has been addressed from the start of the book is the church, the bride. And despite all flaws, failures, mistakes and stumbles, is still greatly loved. The entire book is, essentially, a love letter from Christ to each person in the world. It is a wild, wild, love.

And so after all, it is a romantic book. It celebrates the highest Romance in the history of the World. Hopefully, it should remind this newly married couple of their place in echoing, entering, and living this Great Mystery.

“Everything hearkens back to your throbbing Heart. Time and the seasons still hammer away and create, and your Heart still drives the world and all its happenings forward with great, painful blows. It is the unrest of the clock and your Heart is restless until we rest in you, once time and eternity have become interfused. But: be at peace! I have overcome the world. The torment of sin had already been submerged in the stillness of love. The experience of what the world is has made love darker, more fiery, more ardent. The shallower abyss of rebellion has been swallowed up in unfathomable mercy, and throbbing majestically reigns serene the Heart of God.” ~ Chapter 13: Love – A Wilderness

Christ as Bridegroom

* “The Witching Hour” is three in the morning, when daimons prefer to visit their mortal instruments.

Mel’s Meme: You Have Stolen My Heart

Literary pickup lines? Seriously? Who wrote this meme?

Oh. Yeah. Ahem.

That was me.

Sorry.

This is one that I deliberately left open. It requires some personal definition. And when it comes down to testing it, it all depends on the people involved.

I like to protest that I am not a romantic person, and keep a slightly cynical cloak about me to protect myself from the world.

But when pushed, I find that I do have a penchant for the sweet and sincere and lovely.

I admit that almost any line from John Donne makes my heart beat quickly. A particularly good reading of “The Flea” makes laugh and smile, capturing both my attention and my affection.

And I would swoon over the man who can deliver  the line, “I will live in thy heart, die in the lap, and be buried in thy eyes; and moreover, I will go with thee to thy uncle’s!”

Because there is something that line that encapsulates the heart of romance for me. It has the dual strength of poetic devotion and practical aid; the promise of union in both spiritual and material worlds.

Which brings to me to The One Reference To Rule . . .  er, My Heart, Mind, and Soul:

The Song of Songs

(Aka: The Song of Solomon, The Canticle of Canticles)

This is book is, frankly, hilarious. I first read it when I was about twelve or thirteen, and could not stop giggling. “Your hair is like a flock of goats”? Strange. How is that a compliment?

Any woman drawn by these descriptions would look pretty odd. (Like here.)

But at the heart of the Song of Songs is a deep, dramatic, devoted adoration of the beloved. The similes may sound a tad amusing, but they are rooted in deep affection and deep reality.

Like the above quote from my man Benedick, this poem unites two worlds. It is rooted in the “material world”. It addresses the physical beauties and difficulties that we know, from the immediately accessible similes, to the earnest admiration and desire beneath the words. It is deeply, deeply sensual. Often this is all read as a pure allegory, for when taken as literal truth it feels a bit . . . uncomfortable to read.

There is certainly that level of meaning, the allusion to the sacred union of God and the church, the devotion that we the Bride should feel for our intensely loving bridegroom. In Aquinas’ commentary, he opens up the meanings of the phrases that I find ridiculous, and layers their sweet expression with the sublime gravity and intensity of spiritual truth.

But it maintains both worlds, full in of themselves, within the same imagery. As poetry, it achieves what Allen calls the “symbolic imagination”.

And in doing so, it becomes one of the most beautiful books of the Bible.

It has the romantic devotion rightly ordered, the spiritual truth, the unity of spiritual and practical meaning, and the simplicity of two loving  hearts aching to be as one.

Er, simple. Yes.

It is, ultimately the most poetic retelling of the greatest love story.

Some phrases might make me laugh, still. But that is not a bad thing.

This poem it is intensely, devotedly, beautifully romantic.

Once a friend found me reading this, and he warned me quite seriously, “Be careful! That book might teach you to love!”

He

1 How beautiful you are, my darling!
Oh, how beautiful!
Your eyes behind your veil are doves.
Your hair is like a flock of goats
descending from the hills of Gilead.
² Your teeth are like a flock of sheep just shorn,
coming up from the washing.
Each has its twin;
not one of them is alone.
³ Your lips are like a scarlet ribbon;
your mouth is lovely.
Your temples behind your veil
are like the halves of a pomegranate.
⁴ Your neck is like the tower of David,
built with courses of stone;
on it hang a thousand shields,
all of them shields of warriors.
⁵ Your breasts are like two fawns,
like twin fawns of a gazelle
that browse among the lilies.
⁶ Until the day breaks
and the shadows flee,
I will go to the mountain of myrrh
and to the hill of incense.
⁷ You are altogether beautiful, my darling;
there is no flaw in you.

⁸ Come with me from Lebanon, my bride,
come with me from Lebanon.
Descend from the crest of Amana,
from the top of Senir, the summit of Hermon,
from the lions’ dens
and the mountain haunts of leopards.
⁹ You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride;
you have stolen my heart
with one glance of your eyes,
with one jewel of your necklace.
¹⁰ How delightful is your love , my sister, my bride!
How much more pleasing is your love than wine,
and the fragrance of your perfume
more than any spice!
¹¹ Your lips drop sweetness as the honeycomb, my bride;
milk and honey are under your tongue.
The fragrance of your garments
is like the fragrance of Lebanon.
¹² You are a garden locked up, my sister, my bride;
you are a spring enclosed, a sealed fountain.
¹³ Your plants are an orchard of pomegranates
with choice fruits,
with henna and nard,
¹⁴     nard and saffron,
calamus and cinnamon,
with every kind of incense tree,
with myrrh and aloes
and all the finest spices.
¹⁵ You are a garden fountain,
a well of flowing water
streaming down from Lebanon.

She

¹⁶ Awake, north wind,
and come, south wind!
Blow on my garden,
that its fragrance may spread everywhere.
Let my beloved come into his garden
and taste its choice fruits.