[The chorus of young women]
7 [a]How beautiful are your feet in their sandals, noble daughter!
The curves of your thighs are like ornaments,
like the work of an artist’s hands.
2 Your navel is a round bowl.
May it always be filled with spiced wine.
Your waist is a bundle of wheat enclosed in lilies.
3 Your breasts are like two fawns,
twins of a gazelle.
4 Your neck is like an ivory tower.
Your eyes are like pools in Heshbon, pools by the gate of Bath Rabbim.
Your nose is like a Lebanese tower facing Damascus.
5 You hold your head as high as Mount Carmel.
Your dangling curls are royal beauty.
Your flowing locks could hold a king captive.
Solomon Longs for the Young Woman’s Affection
[Groom]
6 How beautiful and charming you are, my love, with your elegance.
7 Young woman,
your figure is like a palm tree,
and your breasts are like its clusters.
8 I thought, “I will climb the palm tree
and take hold of its fruit.”
May your breasts be like clusters on the vine.
May the fragrance of your breath be like apples.
9 May your mouth taste like the best wine . . .
[Bride]
. . . that goes down smoothly to my beloved
and glides over the lips of those about to sleep.[b]
10 I am my beloved’s, and he longs for me.
11 Come, my beloved.
Let’s go into the field.
Let’s spend the night among the henna flowers.[c]
12 Let’s go to the vineyards early.
Let’s see if the vines have budded,
if the grape blossoms have opened,
if the pomegranates are in bloom.
There I will give you my love.
13 The mandrakes[d] give off a fragrance,
and at our door are all kinds of precious fruits.
I have saved new and old things
for you alone, my beloved.
Footnotes
- Song of Solomon 7:1 Song of Songs 7:1–13 in English Bibles is Song of Songs 7:2–14 in the Hebrew Bible.
- Song of Solomon 7:9 Or “flowing gently over lips and teeth.”
- Song of Solomon 7:11 Or “in the villages.”
- Song of Solomon 7:13 Mandrakes were thought to stimulate sexual desire.