Venice masks

Sunday, 21 June 2026

Why does my lover rage - Moses ibn Ezra

Why does my lover rage and tyrannize me,
      While my heart
            Bends like a reed to him?

Has he forgotten how l followed him in lust
      Through desert wastes?
            But now l call and he is still.

And though he kill me. yet in him I hope.
      And though he hide.
            I turn my face to him.

The master loves his slave for evermore.
      That cannot change.
            For how can gold go dim?

Moses ibn Ezra [Rabbi Moses ben Jacob ibn Ezra, known as Ha-Sallaḥ] (ca. 1055-60 to after 1138) Spain
Translated by Raymond P. Sheindlin
Source: The Gazelle : medieval Hebrew poems on God, Israel, and the soul, Raymond P. Sheindlin, The Jewish Publication Society, 1991

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