"The Canticles" is a traditional name for the Song of Solomon, or the Song of Songs ["Best Song Ever"] in Hebrew. It is also my preferred name for the Song of Solomon. Henceforth I shall use Canticles in the place of the Song of Solomon, except in Biblical references.
It is both amusing and cringe, the efforts of some people to interpret the Canticles as an allegory of God's love for His people.
Song of Solomon 4:1-5
[1]Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves' eyes within thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from mount Gilead.
[2]Thy teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn, which came up from the washing; whereof every one bear twins, and none is barren among them.
[3]Thy lips are like a thread of scarlet, and thy speech is comely: thy temples are like a piece of a pomegranate within thy locks.
[4]Thy neck is like the tower of David builded for an armoury, whereon there hang a thousand bucklers, all shields of mighty men.
[5]Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, which feed among the lilies.
Pretty raunchy for mere figures of speech, huh?
There has been a time-honored tradition of trying to keep the Canticles out of the Bible, or (since that obviously didn't succeed) to regard its literal interpretation as shallow and carnal. Bernard of Clairvaux was said to have written 86 sermons on the Canticles, poring over every figure of speech and interpreting it as a facet of God's love for His Bride.
This approach, while legitimate, may not have been the author's original intent. The Canticles may have been written by a detractor in the Northern Kingdom, intended to display Solomon in a bad light. On the other hand, it may have been written by an anonymous Jew during the Captivity and may have been sung at weddings. Still, our ability to love our spouses or partners is a divine gift, and the love shared between the Lover and the Beloved described in the Canticles is so pure and inspiring it's difficult not to see God's own fingerprint in it.
God willed this book to be included in the Bible, probably not for our allegorical gymnastics but to show that with divine blessing, "mere" human love can still be beautiful and worthy of celebration. In that regard, the Canticles are meant to show the highest form of romantic love between lovers, of which Tennyson wrote: "[The Canticles are] the most perfect Idyll of the faithful love of a country girl and her shepherd, and of her resistances to the advances of a great king, that was ever written."
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I have copied below a summary of the Canticles from my old Bible.
Ch. 1. 1-2. 7. A Shulamite maiden la brought to the royal residence and put in charge of the "daughters of Jerusalem" or court ladies. She longs for her shepherd lover and repels the advances of the king. She adjures the court ladies not to tempt her to love another.
Ch. 2. 8-3, 5. She describes a past visit from the shepherd in her home; and a recent dream that she had sought and found him. She adjures the court ladies as before.
Ch. 3. 6-5. 1. Solomon in all his glory seeks to win the heart of the Shulamite. The shepherd's real or imagined offer to rescue his betrothed from her extreme peril: "Come with me from Lebanon, my spouse..from the lions' dens, from the mountains of the leopards." He praises her charms and her constancy.
Ch. 5. 2-8.4. Dream of the Shulamite, in which she seeks but fails to find her vanished lover. She describes the person of her beloved. The king flatters her, but all her desire is for the shepherd, whom she calls upon to return with her to their native place. She adjures the court ladies as before.
Ch. 8.5-14. The return home. The divine flame of love. The reward of constancy.