III.20The Reading of the Signs
Thou hid'st it, yet thine eye, disdaining all restraint,
Something, I know not, what, would utter of complaint.
Though you would conceal (your feelings), your painted eyes would not, for, transgressing (their bounds), they tell (me) something.
The simple one whose beauty fills mine eye, whose shoulders curve
Like bambu stem, hath all a woman's modest sweet reserve.
Unusually great is the female simplicity of your maid whose beauty fills my eyes and whose shoulders resemble the bamboo.
As through the crystal beads is seen the thread on which they 're strung
So in her beauty gleams some thought cannot find a tongue.
There is something that is implied in the beauty of this woman, like the thread that is visible in a garland of gems.
As fragrance in the opening bud, some secret lies
Concealed in budding smile of this dear damsel's eyes.
There is something in the unmatured smile of this maid like the fragrance that is contained in an unblossomed bud.
The secret wiles of her with thronging armlets decked,
Are medicines by which my raising grief is checked.
The well-meant departure of her whose bangles are tight-fitting contains a remedy that can cure my great sorrow.
While lovingly embracing me, his heart is only grieved:
It makes me think that I again shall live of love bereaved.
The embrace that fills me with comfort and gladness is capable of enduring (my former) sorrow and meditating on his want of love.
My severance from the lord of this cool shore,
My very armlets told me long before.
My bracelets have understood before me the (mental) separation of him who rules the cool seashore.
My loved one left me, was it yesterday?
Days seven my pallid body wastes away!
It was but yesterday my lover departed (from me); and it is seven days since my complexion turned sallow.
She viewed her tender arms, she viewed the armlets from them slid;
She viewed her feet: all this the lady did.
She looked at her bracelets, her tender shoulders, and her feet; this was what she did there (significantly).
To show by eye the pain of love, and for relief to pray,
Is womanhood's most womanly device, men say.
To express their love-sickness by their eyes and resort to begging bespeaks more than ordinary female excellence.