Vis and Ramin

VIS AGAIN BEGS RAMIN TO COME BACK 855
God for the taking of my blood, or what worse can befall
me than this, that I should no longer have either heart 1 or
lover ? For whom shall I lose my heart ? She would no more
have my love than I my heart ! But if God is the Judge
of the earth, He will not reject my plaint.
Would that my
heart approved what I have done ! And that thou wert my
lover completely, and not Gul's. 2
"How can (thy) heart even speak of going away from
me? Art thou not he whom they called constant?
Alas ! for by my fate even thou art become weary of me !
What has become of all thine oaths that thou dost not
remember even one of them now ? Therefore I instructed
my foolish heart, and told myself not to fall in love with
such a fickle one, since (quoth I) thou knowest the in-
it (my heart) hearkened 405
But constancy of Ramin's heart !
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not ; the advice was in vain, and I know not at all how
it will be with me in the end. Why dost thou make me
wait here so long ? and how long wilt thou cause tears of
blood to flow from mine eyes ?
" If thou art disposed to come back, I adjure thee to
come back. The cold here is killing me ; and if thou art not
coming back, take me away
with thee whithersoever thou
goest. I will never leave thee. However hard the road
may be, with thee it will be easy to me ; however shelterless
I may be with thee, and undesired by thee, if thou cut me
not off from thy hand and thy bosom, thou canst not make
me lose hope. I cannot live a moment without thee.
Though my heart were even a rock in hardness, it could not
bear separation from thee. Behold, thou desirest to take
away the choice of my soul, and to leave me wandering and
melancholy in the fields. Go, and thou wilt take the colour
from my face and the power from my body, and patience
and wits. Why art thou so merciless and hard-hearted to
me that thou wilt not be melted by BO many entreaties?"
The heart-ravisher Vis entreated, but Ramin's heart was
1 ? OuU ? Gul.
8 The play on the word Qul is impossible to translate.