XIII: For the soul's journey, the white steed became…

For the soul's journey, the white steed became saddled in the heart,
When upon my chin grew white the hair of youthful days.

When the spring-time of youth unto the body bade adieu,
The black hair waxed silvery in the autumn of old age.

Since the miseries of absence have not reduced them to ashes;
What! have these bones of my body, all, into iron turned?

Either my good fortune, fallen asleep, giveth me no aid,
Or the rulers of the present age have stony-hearted grown.

Whereas the heads thereof make no impression on their bodies,
On their armour must have broken the arrows of my sighs.

Sorrow, to this degree, causeth the blood from mine eyes to flow,
That the garments of my body have become tinged therefrom.

Behold the state of my eyeballs, by separation caused!
They have assumed the appearance of red roses within the parterre!

Though in the heart it may not have fallen, woe's seed sprouteth,
When, by the plough of disjunction, its ground-plot may be turned.

Would, O SEPARATED! that absence were, in the world, unknown;
For from its inroads have become desolate the people thereof!