1 My son, pay attention to my words. Treasure my commands that are within you.

2 Obey my commands so that you may live. Follow my teachings just as you protect the pupil of your eye.

3 Tie them on your fingers. Write them on the tablet of your heart.

4 Say to wisdom, "You are my sister." Give the name "my relative" to understanding

5 in order to guard yourself from an adulterous woman, from a loose woman with her smooth talk.

6 From a window in my house I looked through my screen.

7 I was looking at gullible people when I saw a young man without much sense among youths.

8 He was crossing a street near her corner and walking toward her house

9 in the twilight, in the evening, in the dark hours of the night.

10 A woman with an ulterior motive meets him. She is dressed as a prostitute.

11 She is loud and rebellious. Her feet will not stay at home.

12 One moment she is out on the street, the next she is at the curb, on the prowl at every corner.

13 She grabs him and kisses him and brazenly says to him,

14 "I have some sacrificial meat. Today I kept my vows.

15 That's why I came to meet you. Eagerly, I looked for you, and I've found you.

16 I've made my bed, with colored sheets of Egyptian linen.

17 I've sprinkled my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.

18 Come, let's drink our fill of love until morning. Let's enjoy making love,

19 because my husband's not home. He has gone on a long trip.

20 He took lots of money with him. He won't be home for a couple of weeks."

21 With all her seductive charms, she persuades him. With her smooth lips, she makes him give in.

22 He immediately follows her like a steer on its way to be slaughtered, like a ram hobbling into captivity

23 until an arrow pierces his heart, like a bird darting into a trap. He does not realize that it will cost him his life.

24 Now, sons, listen to me. Pay attention to the words from my mouth.

25 Do not let your heart be turned to her ways. Do not wander onto her paths,

26 because she has brought down many victims, and she has killed all too many.

27 Her home is the way to hell and leads to the darkest vaults of death.