¹Night after night on my bed

I looked for the man I love.

I looked for him, but I didn’t find him.

²“I will get up now and roam the city,

through the streets and the open places,

I will look for the man I love.”

I looked for him, but I didn’t find him.

³The guards roaming the city found me.

“Have you seen the man I love?”

⁴Scarcely had I left them,

when I found the man I love.

I took hold of him

and would not let him go

until I had brought him to my mother’s house,

to the bedroom of the woman who conceived me.

⁵I warn you, daughters of Yerushalayim,

by the gazelles and deer in the wilds,

not to awaken or stir up love

until it wants to arise!

⁶Who is this, coming up from the desert

like a column of smoke,

perfumed with myrrh and frankincense,

chosen from the merchant’s crushed spices?

⁷It is Shlomo’s litter,

escorted by sixty valiant men

chosen from Isra’el’s finest;

⁸all of them wield the sword

and are expert fighters;

each one has his sword ready at his side

to combat the terrors of night.

⁹King Shlomo made himself a royal litter

of wood from the L’vanon.

¹⁰He made its columns of silver,

its roof of gold, its seat of purple cloth;

its inside was lovingly inlaid

by the daughters of Yerushalayim.

¹¹Daughters of Tziyon, come out,

and gaze upon King Shlomo,

wearing the crown with which his mother crowned him

on his wedding day, his day of joy!