With words:
My Beloved don’t be heartless with me
Your Presence is my only cure
How can I be left with neither a heart nor my Beloved?
Either give me back my heart, or do not deny me
Your Presence
-Abu Sai’d Abu’l Khayr (trans. Vraje Abramian)
from Nobody Son of Nobody. Hohm Press, 2001
Without words:
Arc ‘Antiga, a beautiful Portuguese guitar solo from Cristina Branco’s album Murmúrios, below:
With Words (my own):
The tongue is the face of the heart
And its mouth the heart of the face
Your face has swallowed my heart
So all I talk about is your face
So give me back my poor heart
Or take pity on its sad face
Tongues were made for more than talking
Stop flirting and let me taste
At last, a cure for all my pains
Alas, it’s pain without a cure
A sickness that treats all disease
A ravishing that made me pure
A wound that heals all other scars
A wine that made my head sober
An ocean that dried all my tears
A birth that meant my life’s over
I fell ill heartfirst in this love
There’s neither hope nor remedy
A prison that broke all life’s bars
My friend, please don’t let me be free
A poison that made me immune
To health and all I once thought best
A death in life and life in death
Came to me on your gentle breath
You forged these chains and set me free
I’m your dream, you’re my memory
Don’t forget me, I beg you please
My darkness, light, health and disease
My love is yours, so yours is mine
So lift my ore out of this mine
Don’t leave me shrouded in my mind
Love flows behind the clouds of time
Only my death will end our war
My perfections stain your faults
My waves will crash upon your shore
Until your rocks become my salt
Your memory’s an old war wound
My heart aches when it rains
My eyes want to cry with the sky
But fill with silent pain
The softest, sweetest hurt I know
Seeing your face, hearing your name
How can you seem so far away
When it’s your love that fills my veins?
Good article “Variations on a theme (with words and without)”