"This messenger shall give my news to thee; * Patience what while my sight thou canst not see: A lover leav'st in love's insanity, * Whose eyne abide on wake incessantly: I suffer patience-pangs in woes that none * Of men can medicine;—such my destiny! Keep cool thine eyes; ne'er shall my heart forget, * Nor without dream of thee one day shall be. Look what befel thy wasted frame, and thence * Argue what I am doomed for love to dree! "And afterwards[FN#200]: Without fingers[FN#201] I have written to thee, and without tongue I have spoken to thee * to resume my case, I have an eye wherefrom sleeplessness departeth not * and a heart whence sorrowful thought stirreth not * It is with me as though health I had never known * nor in sadness ever ceased to wone * nor spent an hour in pleasant place * but it is as if I were made up of pine and of the pain of passion and chagrin * Sickness unceasingly troubleth * and my yearning ever redoubleth * desire still groweth * and longing in my heart still gloweth * I pray Allah to hasten our union * and dispel of my mind the confusion * And I would fain thou favour me * with some words of thine * that I may cheer my heart in pain and repine * Moreover, I would have thee put on a patience lief, until Allah vouchsafe relief * And His peace be with thee."[FN#202] When Ali bin Bakkar had read this letter he said in weak accents and feeble voice, "With what hand shall I write and with what tongue shall I make moan and lament? Indeed she addeth sickness to my sickness and draweth death upon my death!" Then he sat up and taking in hand ink-case and paper, wrote the following reply, "In the name of Allah, the Compassionating, the Compassionate![FN#203] Thy letter hath reached me, O my lady, and hath given ease to a sprite worn out with passion and love-longing, and hath brought healing to a wounded heart cankered with languishment and sickness; for indeed I am become even as saith the poet, 'Straitened bosom; reveries dispread; * Slumberless eyelids; body wearied; Patience cut short; disunion longsomest; * Reason deranged and heart whose life is fled!' And know that complaining is unavailing; but it easeth him whom love-longing disordereth and separation destroyeth and, with repeating, 'Union,' I keep myself comforted and how fine is the saying of the poet who said, 'Did not in love-plight joys and sorrows meet, * How would the message or the writ be sweet?'"