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I send thee, O my hope, a letter, to complain Of all my soul endures for parting and its pain.
Six lines it hath; the first, ‘A fire is in my heart;’ The next line setteth forth my passion all in vain;
The third, ‘My patience fails and eke my life doth waste;’ The fourth, ‘All love with me for ever shall remain.’
The fifth, ‘When shall mine eyes behold thee?’ And the sixth, ‘When shall the day betide of meeting for us twain?’
And by way of subscription he wrote these words, ‘This letter is from the captive of desire, prisoned in the hold of longing, from which there is no deliverance but in union and intercourse with her whom he loveth, after absence and separation: for he suffereth grievous torment by reason of his severance from his beloved.’ Then his tears rushed out and he wrote the following verses:
I write to thee, my love, and the tears run down as I write; For the tears of my eyes, alack I cease never day or night.
Yet do I not despair; mayhap, of God His grace, The day shall dawn for us of union and delight.
Then he folded the letter and sealed it and gave it to the old woman, saying, ‘Carry it to the lady Dunya.’ ‘I hear and obey,’ answered she; whereupon he gave her a thousand dinars and said to her, ‘O my mother, accept this, as a token of my affection.’ She took the letter and the money, calling down blessings on him, and returned to the princess. When the latter saw her, she said to her, ‘O my nurse, what is it he asks, that we may fulfil his wish to him?’ ‘O my lady,’ replied the old woman, ‘he sends thee this letter by me, and I know not what is in it.’ The princess took the letter and reading it, exclaimed, ‘Who and what is this merchant that he should dare to write to me thus?’ And she buffeted her face, saying, ‘What have we done that we should come in converse with shopkeepers? Alas! Alas! By Allah, but that I fear God the Most High, I would put him to death and crucify him before his shop!’ ‘What is in the letter,’ asked the old
