✧This is Solomon’s Song of Songs. ✧2Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth! For your love is more delightful than wine. ✧3The fragrance of your perfume is pleasing; your name is like perfume poured out. No wonder the maidens adore you. ✧4Take me away with you—let us hurry! May the king bring me to his chambers. We will rejoice and delight in you; we will praise your love more than wine. It is only right that they adore you. ✧5I am dark, yet lovely, O daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents of Kedar, like the curtains of Solomon. ✧6Do not stare because I am dark, for the sun has gazed upon me. My mother’s sons were angry with me; they made me a keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard I have neglected. ✧7Tell me, O one I love, where do you pasture your sheep? Where do you rest them at midday? Why should I be like a veiled woman beside the flocks of your companions? ✧8If you do not know, O fairest of women, follow the tracks of the flock, and graze your young goats near the tents of the shepherds. ✧9I compare you, my darling, to a mare among Pharaoh’s chariots. ✧10Your cheeks are beautiful with ornaments, your neck with strings of jewels. ✧11We will make you ornaments of gold, studded with beads of silver.