"Say me, will Union after parting e'er return to be * After long-lasting torments, after hopeless misery? Alas! Alas! what wont to be shall never more return * But grant me still return of dearest her these eyne may see. I wonder me will Allah deign our parted lives unite * And will my dear one's plighted troth preserve with constancy! Naught am I save the prey of death since parting parted us; * And will my friends consent that I a weird so deadly dree? Alas my sorrow! Sorrowing the lover scant avails; * Indeed I melt away in grief and passion's ecstasy: Past is the time of my delight when were we two conjoined: * Would Heaven I wot if Destiny mine esperance will degree! Redouble then, O Heart, thy pains and, O mine eyes, o'erflow * With tears till not a tear remain within these eyne of me? Again alas for loved ones lost and loss of patience eke! * For helpers fail me and my griefs are grown beyond decree. The Lord of Threefold Worlds I pray He deign to me return * My lover and we meet as wont in joy and jubilee." Then Nur al-Din wept with weeping galore than which naught could be more; and peering into ever corner of the room, recited these two couplets, "I view their traces and with pain I pine * And by their sometime home I weep and yearn; And Him I pray who parting deigned decree * Some day He deign vouchsafe me their return!" Then Nur al-Din sprang to his feet and locking the door of the house, fared forth running at speed, to the sea shore whence he fixed his eyes on the place of the ship which had carried off his Miriam whilst sighs burst from his breast and tears from his lids as he recited these couplets, "Peace be with you, sans you naught compensateth me * The near, the far, two cases only here I see: I yearn for you at every hour and tide as yearns * For water-place wayfarer plodding wearily. With you abide my hearing, heart and eyen-sight * And (sweeter than the honeycomb) your memory. Then, O my Grief when fared afar your retinue * And bore that ship away my sole expectancy." And Nur al-Din wept and wailed, bemoaned himself and complained, crying out and saying, "O Miriam! O Miriam! Was it but a vision of thee I saw in sleep or in the allusions of dreams?" And by reason of that which grew on him of regrets, he recited these couplets,[FN#506]