Canticle of Canticles 1

NEW JERUSALEM	DOUAI-RHEIMS
1 Solomon's Song of Songs:	1 Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth: for thy breasts are better than wine,
2 BELOVED: Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for your love-making is sweeter than wine;	2 Smelling sweet of the best ointments. Thy name is as oil poured out: therefore young maidens have loved thee.
3 delicate is the fragrance of your perfume, your name is an oil poured out, and that is why girls love you.	3 Draw me: we will run after thee to the odour of thy ointments. The king hath brought me into his storerooms: we will be glad and rejoice in thee, remembering thy breasts more than wine: the righteous love thee.
4 Draw me in your footsteps, let us run. The king has brought me into his rooms; you wil be our joy andour gladness. We shal praise your love more than wine; how right it is to love you.	4 I am black but beautiful, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Cedar, as the curtains of Solomon.
5 BELOVED: I am black but lovely, daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents of Kedar, like the pavilions of Salmah.	5 Do not consider me that I am brown, because the sun hath altered my colour: the sons of my mother have fought against me, they have made me the keeper in the vineyards: my vineyard I have not kept.
6 Take no notice of my dark colouring, it is the sun that has burnt me. My mother's sons turned their angeron me, they made me look after the vineyards. My own vineyard I had not looked after!	6 Shew me, O thou whom my soul loveth, where thou feedest, where thou liest in the midday, lest I begin to wander after the flocks of thy companions.
7 Tel me then, sweetheart, where wil you lead your flock to graze, where will you rest it at noon? That Imay no more wander like a vagabond beside the flocks of your companions.	7 If thou know not thyself, O fairest among women, go forth, and follow after the steps of the flocks, and feed thy kids beside the tents of the shepherds.
8 CHORUS: If you do not know this, O loveliest of women, fol ow the tracks of the flock, and take your kidsto graze close by the shepherds' tents.	8 To my company of horsemen, in Pharao's chariots, have I likened thee, O my love.
9 LOVER: I compare you, my love, to my mare harnessed to Pharaoh's chariot.	9 Thy cheeks are beautiful as the turtledove's, thy neck as jewels.
10 Your cheeks show fair between their pendants and your neck within its necklaces.	10 We will make thee chains of gold, inlaid with silver.
11 We shall make you golden earrings and beads of silver.	11 While the king was at his repose, my spikenard sent forth the odour thereof.
12 DUO: -While the king rests in his own room my nard yields its perfume.	12 A bundle of myrrh is my beloved to me, he shall abide between my breasts.
13 My love is a sachet of myrrh lying between my breasts.	13 A cluster of cypress my love is to me, in the vineyards of Engaddi.
14 My love is a cluster of henna flowers among the vines of En-Gedi.	14 Behold thou art fair, O my love, behold thou art fair, thy eyes are as those of doves.
15 -How beautiful you are, my beloved, how beautiful you are! Your eyes are doves.	15 Behold thou art fair, my beloved, and comely. Our bed is flourishing.
16 -How beautiful you are, my love, and how you delight me! Our bed is the greensward.	16 The beams of our houses are of cedar, our rafters of cypress trees.
17 -The beams of our house are cedar trees, its panel ing the cypress.