{The Ballad of Ballads of Solomon} O that thy mouth would give me a kiss!

W Oh, that he would kiss me with the kisses of his mouth!
For your love is more delightful than wine.

Take me with you—let us hurry.
Oh, that the king would bring me to his chambers.Y We will rejoice and be glad for you;
we will praise your love more than wine.W It is only right that they adore you.

It was but a little that I passed from them, but I found him whom my soul loveth: I held him, and would not let him go, until I had brought him into my mother's house, and into the chamber of her that conceived me.

Y What makes the one you love better than another,
most beautiful of women?
What makes him better than another,
that you would give us this charge?

Where has your beloved gone, O you fairest among women? [Again the ladies showed their interest in the remarkable person whom the Shulammite had championed with such unstinted praise; they too wanted to know him, they insisted.] Where is your beloved hiding himself? For we would seek him with you.

Return, return, O Shulamite; Return, return, that we may look upon thee. What would ye look upon in the Shulamite? As it were the dance of two camps.

O that thou wert as my brother, that sucked the breasts of my mother! when I should find thee without, I would kiss thee; yea, I should not be despised.

I would lead thee, and bring thee into my mother's house, who would instruct me: I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate.

His left hand would be under my head, And his right hand embrace me.

Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned.