Chapter 8

  Oh that you were my brother, who took milk from my mother's breasts! When I came to you in the street, I would give you kisses; yes, I would not be looked down on.  

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  I would take you by the hand into my mother's house, and she would be my teacher. I would give you drink of spiced wine, drink of the pomegranate.  

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  His left hand would be under my head, and his right hand about me.  

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  I say to you, O daughters of Jerusalem, do not let love be moved till it is ready.  

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  Who is this, who comes up from the waste places, resting on her loved one? It was I who made you awake under the apple-tree, where your mother gave you birth; there she was in pain at your birth.  

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  Put me as a sign on your heart, as a sign on your arm; love is strong as death, and wrath bitter as the underworld: its coals are coals of fire; violent are its flames.  

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  Much water may not put out love, or the deep waters overcome it: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would be judged a price not great enough.  

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  We have a young sister, and she has no breasts; what are we to do for our sister in the day when she is given to a man?  

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  If she is a wall, we will make on her a strong base of silver; and if she is a door, we will let her be shut up with cedar-wood.  

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  I am a wall, and my breasts are like towers; then was I in his eyes as one to whom good chance had come.  

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  Solomon had a vine-garden at Baal-hamon; he let out the vine-garden to keepers; every one had to give a thousand bits of silver for its fruit.  

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  My vine-garden, which is mine, is before me: you, O Solomon, will have the thousand, and those who keep the fruit of them two hundred.  

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  You who have your resting-place in the gardens, the friends give ear to your voice; make me give ear to it.  

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  Come quickly, my loved one, and be like a roe on the mountains of spice.  

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