"Give back mine eyes their sleep long ravished * And say me whither be my reason fled: I learnt that lending to thy love a place * Sleep to mine eyelids mortal foe was made. They said, "We held thee righteous, who waylaid * Thy soul?" "Go ask his glorious eyes," I said. I pardon all my blood he pleased to spill * Owning his troubles drove him blood to shed. On my mind's mirror sun like sheen he cast * Whose keen reflection fire in vitals bred Waters of Life let Allah waste at will * Suffice my wage those lips of dewy red: An thou address my love thou'lt find a cause * For plaint and tears or ruth or lustihed. In water pure his form shall greet your eyne * When fails the bowl nor need ye drink of wine.[FN#180]" Then she quoted from the same ode:— "I drank, but the draught of his glance, not wine, * And his swaying gait swayed to sleep these eyne: 'Twas not grape juice grips me but grasp of Past * 'Twas not bowl o'erbowled me but gifts divine: His coiling curl-lets my soul ennetted * And his cruel will all my wits outwitted.[FN#181]" After a pause she resumed:— "If we 'plain of absence what shall we say? * Or if pain afflict us where wend our way? An I hire a truchman[FN#182] to tell my tale * The lover's plaint is not told for pay: If I put on patience, a lover's life * After loss of love will not last a day: Naught is left me now but regret, repine * And tears flooding cheeks for ever and aye: O thou who the babes of these eyes[FN#183] hast fled * Thou art homed in heart that shall never stray Would heaven I wot hast thou kept our pact * Long as stream shall flow, to have firmest fay? Or hast forgotten the weeping slave * Whom groans afflict and whom griefs waylay? Ah, when severance ends and we side by side * Couch, I'll blame thy rigours and chide thy pride!" Now when the portress heard her second ode she shrieked aloud and said, "By Allah! 'tis right good!"; and laying hands on her garments tore them, as she did the first time, and fell to the ground fainting. Thereupon the procuratrix rose end brought her a second change of clothes after she had sprinkled water on her. She recovered and sat upright and said to her sister the cateress, "Onwards, and help me in my duty, for there remains but this one song." So the provisioneress again brought out the lute and began to sing these verses:—