Let not your eyes be turned on me, because I am dark, because I was looked on by the sun; my mother's children were angry with me; they made me the keeper of the vine-gardens; but my vine-garden I have not kept.

As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood, so is my loved one among the sons. I took my rest under his shade with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.

He took me to the house of wine, and his flag over me was love.

By night on my bed I was looking for him who is the love of my soul: I was looking for him, but I did not see him.

I was but a little way from them, when I came face to face with him who is the love of my soul. I took him by the hands, and did not let him go, till I had taken him into my mother's house, and into the room of her who gave me birth.

Go out, O daughters of Jerusalem, and see King Solomon, with the crown which his mother put on his head on the day when he was married, and on the day of the joy of his heart.

My loved one put his hand on the door, and my heart was moved for him.

I made the door open to my loved one; but my loved one had taken himself away, and was gone, my soul was feeble when his back was turned on me; I went after him, but I did not come near him; I said his name, but he gave me no answer.

I went down into the garden of nuts to see the green plants of the valley, and to see if the vine was in bud, and the pomegranate-trees were in flower.

Before I was conscious of it, ...

Who is this, who comes up from the waste places, resting on her loved one? It was I who made you awake under the apple-tree, where your mother gave you birth; there she was in pain at your birth.

I am a wall, and my breasts are like towers; then was I in his eyes as one to whom good chance had come.