149
TheLexicon Seguerianumdefines—
'Ἄκακοςone who has no experience of ill, not, one who is good-natured. So Sappho uses the word.'
150
TheEtymologicum Magnumdefines—
Ἀμαμαξύςa vine trained on long poles, and says Sappho makes the pluralἀμαμάξυδες. So Choeroboscus, late in the sixth centuryA.D., says 'the occurrence of the genitiveἀμαμαξύδος[the usual form beingἀμαμάξυος] in Sappho is strange.'
151
TheEtymologicum Magnumsays ofἈμάρα,a trench for watering meadows, 'because it is raised by a water-bucket,ἄμηbeing a mason's instrument'—that it is a word Sappho seems to have used; and Orion, about the fifth centuryA.D., also explains the word similarly, and says Sappho used it.
152
Apollonius says:—
'And in this way metaplasms of words [i.e., tenses or cases formed from non-existent presents or nominatives] arise, likeἐρυσάρματες[chariot-drawing],λῖτα[cloths], and in Sapphoτὸ αὔα, Dawn.'
And theEtymologicum Magnumsays:—
'We findπαρὰ τὴν αὔαν[during the morning] in Aeolic, for "during the day."'
153
TheEtymologicum Magnumsays:—
'Αὔωςorἠώς, that is, the day; thus we read in Aeolic. Sappho has—
πότνια αὔως,
πότνια αὔως,
Queen Dawn.'
Queen Dawn.'
The solemn Dawn.Frederick Tennyson.
The solemn Dawn.
Frederick Tennyson.
154
Athenaeus says:—
'Theβάρωμος[baromos] andσάρβιτος[sarbĭtos], both of which are mentioned by Sappho and Anacreon, and the Magădis and the Triangles and the Sambūcae, are all ancient instruments.'
Athenaeus in another place, apparently more correctly, gives the name of the first asβάρμος[barmos].
What these instruments precisely were is unknown. Cf. p.46.
155
Pollux says:—
'Sappho used the wordβεῦδοςfora woman's dress, akimberĭcon, a kind of short transparent frock.'
156
Phrynĭchus the grammarian, about 180A.D., says:—
'Sappho callsa woman's dressing-case, where she keeps her scents and such things,γρύτη.'
157
Hesychius, about 370A.D., says Sappho called ZeusἝκτωρ,Hector,i.e.'holding fast.'
158
A ParisianMS.edited by Cramer says:—
'Among the Aeoliansζis used forδ, as when Sappho saysζάβατονforδιάβατον,fordable.'
159
A Scholiast on Homer quotesἀγαγοίην,may I lead, from Sappho.
160
Eustathius, commenting on theIliad, quotes the grammarian Aristophanes [about 260B.C.] saying that Sappho calls a wind that is as if twisted up and descending, a cyclone,ἄνεμον κατάρη,a wind rushing from above.
Nauck would restore the epithet to verse 2 of fr.42.
161
Choeroboscus says:—
'Sappho makes the accusative ofκίνδυνοςdangerκίνδυν.'
Another writer, in theCodex Marc., says:—
'Sappho makes the accusativeκίνδυνα.'
162
Joannes Alexandrinus, about the seventh centuryA.D., says:—
'The acute accent falls either on the last syllable or the last but one or the last but two, but never on the last but three; the accent ofΜήδεϊα[Medeiathe sorceress, wife of Jason] in Sappho is allowed by supposing theειto form a diphthong.'
163
An unknown author, inAntiatticista, says:—
'Sappho, in her second book, callsσμίρναmyrrhμύρρα.'
164
A treatise on grammar edited by Cramer says:—
'The genitive plural ofΜοῦσαisΜωσάωνamong the Laconians,Μοισάωνof the Musesin Sappho.'
165
Phrynichus says:—
Νίτρονnatron(carbonate of soda) is the form 'an Aeolian would use, such as Sappho, with aν; but,' he goes on, 'an Athenian would spell it with aλ,λίτρον.'
166
A Scholiast on Homer,Iliad, iii. 219, says:—
'Sappho saidπολυΐδριδιof much knowledgeas the dative ofπολύϊδρις.'
167
Photius, in hisLexicon, about the ninth centuryA.D., says:—
'Θάψοςis a wood with which they dye wool and hair yellow, which Sappho callsΣκυθικόν ξύλονScythian wood.'
And the Scholiast on Theocritus,Idylii. 88, says:—
'Θάψοςis a kind of wood which is also calledσκυθάριονor Scythian wood, as Sappho says; and in this they dip fleeces and make them of a quince-yellow, and dye their hair yellow; among us it is calledχρυσόξυλονgold-wood.'
Ahrens thinks that here the Scholiast quoted Sappho, and he thus restores the verses:—
macronmacronmacronΖκύθικον ξύλον,τῷ βάπτοισί τε τἤριαποΐεισι δὲ μάλιναξανθίσδοισί τε τὰς τρίχας.
macronmacronmacronΖκύθικον ξύλον,
τῷ βάπτοισί τε τἤρια
ποΐεισι δὲ μάλινα
ξανθίσδοισί τε τὰς τρίχας.
Scythian wood, in which they dip fleeces and make them quince-coloured, and dye their hair yellow.
Thapsusmay have been box-wood, but it is quite uncertain.
168
TheEtymologicum Magnumsays:—
'The Aeolians sayΤίοισιν ὀφθάλμοισινwith what eyes... [usingτίοισιforτίσι, the dative plural ofτίς] as Sappho does.'
169
Orion of Thebes, the grammarian, about 450A.D., says:—
'In Sapphoχελώνηisχελύνηa tortoise'; which is better writtenχελύνα, or ratherχέλυνα, as other writers imply.
170
Pollux says:—
'Bowls with a boss in the middle are calledβαλανειόμφαλοι, circular-bottomed, from their shape,χρυσόμφαλοι, gold-bottomed, from the material, like Sappho'sχρυσαστράγαλοι,with golden ankles.'
Some few other fragments are attributed to Sappho, but Bergk admits none as genuine. Above is to be seen every word which he considered hers. An account of some which have recently been brought to light is given on the succeeding pages.
In the Egyptian Museum at Berlin there are some ancient manuscripts which were bought in the summer of 1879, and which are believed to have come from Medînet-el-Fayûm in Central Egypt, near the ancient Arsinoë or Crocodilopolis. A tiny scrap of parchment among these was deciphered by Professor F. Blass of Kiel, and described by him with much minuteness in theRheinisches Museumfor 1880, vol. xxxv. pp. 287-290. Through the kindness of Dr. Erman, the Director of the Museum, and Professor of Egyptian Archæology in the University, I have been favoured with photographs of each side of this piece of parchment, exactly the size of the original. These have been reproduced in facsimile by the Autotype Company upon the accompanying plate. Some of the minutiæ of the manuscript are lost in the copy, but it gives a fair general idea of the precious relic, and exhibits the manner in which it has been torn and perforated and defaced. It also shows some of the difficulties with which those who decipherancient manuscripts have to contend. Few, at the first glance, would guess how much could be made out of so little.
The letters on each side of the parchment are clearly written, punctuated, and accented. They appear to belong to the eighth centuryA.D., so that the writing is at least a thousand years old. The actual letters are these, those which are not decipherable with certainty being marked off by brackets:—
The two fragments, distinguished by Blass as A. and B., occur, the one on the front, the other on the back of the scrap of parchment. They were edited by Bergk, in the fourth (posthumous) edition of hisPoetae Lyrici Graeci, 1882, vol. iii. pp. 704, 705. Blass ascribed the verses to Sappho, and he is still of opinion that they are hers, from the metre, the dialect, and 'the colour of the diction,' to use his own expression in a letter to me.
Fragment A
Fragment A
Indeed, every word of them makes one feel that no poet or poetess save Sappho could have so exquisitely combined simplicity and beauty. Bergk, however, prints them as of uncertain origin,fragmenta adespota(56 A., 56 B). He agrees with Blass that they are in the Lesbian dialect and the Sapphic metre, but he thinks that they may have been written by Alcaeus. Bergk's decision partly rests upon the statement of Suidas, that Horapollo, the Greek grammarian, who first taught at Alexandria and afterwards at Constantinople, in the reign of Theodosius, about 400A.D., wrote a commentary on Alcaeus; but he gives no reason for believing that these Fayum manuscripts necessarily come from Alexandria: their history is very uncertain. Blass thinks that the greater fame, especially in later times, of Sappho, strongly favours his own view. To my mind there is little doubt that we have herein none but her very words.
A restoration of such imperfect fragments must needs be guess-work. Bergk has, however, attempted it in part, and he has accepted the emendations of Blass in lines 3-5 of fragment A. Bücheler, one of the editors of theRheinisches Museum, has also expressed his views with regard to some of the lines; butthey are not endorsed by the authority of Bergk. According to the latter distinguished scholar, fragment A may have run thus:—
1macronmacronmacronmacronmacronδοκίμοις χάριν μοι οὐκ ἀπυδώσην·macronκλύτων μέν τ' ἐπτερύγηςmacronmacronmacronmacronκάλων κἄσλωνmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronφίλοις, λύπης τέ με κἀπορίπτης5εἰς εμ' ὄνειδος.ἦ κεν οἰδήσαις, ἐπί τ' αἶγ' ἀμέλγωνΣκυρίαν ἄσαιο· τὸ γαρ νόηματὦμον οὐκ οὔτω μαλακόφρον, ἔχθρωςτοῖς διάκηται.10macronmacronμηδ'macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacron
1
1
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronδοκίμοις χάριν μοι οὐκ ἀπυδώσην·
macronκλύτων μέν τ' ἐπτερύγηςmacronmacronmacron
macronκάλων κἄσλωνmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacron
φίλοις, λύπης τέ με κἀπορίπτης
5
5
εἰς εμ' ὄνειδος.
ἦ κεν οἰδήσαις, ἐπί τ' αἶγ' ἀμέλγων
Σκυρίαν ἄσαιο· τὸ γαρ νόημα
τὦμον οὐκ οὔτω μαλακόφρον, ἔχθρως
τοῖς διάκηται.
10
10
macronmacronμηδ'macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacron
In which case it might have had this meaning:—
Thou seemest not to careto returnmy favour; andindeedthou didst fly away from famous ...ofthe fairand noble... to thy friends,and painest me, and castestreproachatme.Trulythou mayst swell, and sate thyselfwith milking a goat of Scyros.Formy mood isnot sosoft-hearted to those soever to whomit is disposedunfriendly ...nor....
The words which are here italicised are those which alone are extant in full in the manuscript; the others are only plausible guesses, though some of them are indicated by the existence of accents and portions of letters.
Bergk's ingenious restoration of lines 6 and 7 is founded on a fragment of Alcaeus (fr. 110), wherein Chrysippus explainsαἴξ Σκυρία, a goat of Scyros, as a proverb of those who spoil kindness (ἐπὶ τῶν τὰς εὐεργεσίας ἀνατρεπόντων), as a goat upsets her milking pail (ἐπειδὴ πολλάκις τὰ ἀγγεῖα ἀνατρέπει ἡ αἴξ). Blass would, however, complete the phrase thus:—
ἐπὶ τ (ᾷ τε λώβᾳκαρδ) ίαν ἄσαιο,
ἐπὶ τ (ᾷ τε λώβᾳ
καρδ) ίαν ἄσαιο,
And with the outrage sate thy heart.
And with the outrage sate thy heart.
Disappointing as this is, the restoration of fragment B. is yet more hopeless. Authorities are agreed as to the position of the words in the Sapphic stanza, thus:—
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronθε θῦμονmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronμι πάμπανmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronδύναμαιmacronmacronmacronmacronmacron5macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἆς κεν ἦ μοιmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἀντιλάμπηνmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronκά) λον πρόσωπονmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronσυ) γχροΐσθεις10macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἔται) ρος.
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronθε θῦμον
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronμι πάμπαν
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronδύναμαι
macronmacronmacronmacronmacron
5
5
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἆς κεν ἦ μοι
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἀντιλάμπην
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronκά) λον πρόσωπον
macronmacronmacronmacronmacron
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronσυ) γχροΐσθεις
10
10
macronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronmacronἔται) ρος.
The only additions hazarded by Bergk, or accepted by him from Blass, are given on the left of the brackets. Bergk says thatδύναμαι(as ifmacronmacronmacron; cf. fr.13) is an old form of theconjunctive forδύνωμαι. He reads line 5,ἆς κεν ἦ μοι, comparing Theocritus, 29, 20,ἆς κεν ἔρης, 'as long as thou lovest': Bergk and Blass alike considerἠas a later form ofᾖ. The words may mean:
... soul ... altogether ... I should be able ... as long indeed as to me ... to flash back ... fair face ... stained over ... friend.
But in the absence of any context the very meaning of the separate words is uncertain.
Bergk thinks that the fragments belong to different poems, unless we read fragment A. after fragment B.; there is nothing on the parchment to indicate sequence.
In fragment B. it will be seen that a space occurs in each place where the last (or Adonic) verses of each Sapphic stanza would have been, as if they had been written more to the left in the manuscript; they probably therefore ranged with the long lines, of which we have only some of the last syllables preserved. Indenting the shorter verses is a modern fashion; the ancient way was to begin each one at the same distance from the margin.
A TRANSLATION OF OVID'S HEROIC EPISTLE, XV.BY ALEXANDER POPE, 1707
Say, lovely youth that dost my heart command,Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?Must then her name the wretched writer prove,To thy remembrance lost as to thy love?Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose,The lute neglected and the lyric Muse:Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow,And tuned my heart to elegies of woe.I burn, I burn, as when through ripened cornBy driving winds the spreading flames are borne.Phaon to Aetna's scorching fields retires,While I consume with more than Aetna's fires.No more my soul a charm in music finds;Music has charms alone for peaceful minds:Soft scenes of solitude no more can please;Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.No more the Lesbian dames my passion move,Once the dear objects of my guilty love:[9]All other loves are lost in only thine,Ah, youth ungrateful to a flame like mine!Whom would not all those blooming charms surprise,Those heavenly looks and dear deluding eyes?The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear,A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear.Would you with ivy wreathe your flowing hair,Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare:Yet Phoebus loved, and Bacchus felt the flame;One Daphne warmed and one the Cretan dame;Nymphs that in verse no more could rival meThan e'en those gods contend in charms with thee.The Muses teach me all their softest lays,And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise.Though great Alcaeus more sublimely sings,And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings,No less renown attends the moving lyreWhich Venus tunes and all her Loves inspire.To me what Nature has in charms deniedIs well by wit's more lasting flames supplied.Though short my stature, yet my name extendsTo heaven itself and earth's remotest ends:Brown as I am, an Aethiopian dameInspired young Perseus with a generous flame:Turtles and doves of different hue unite,And glossy jet is paired with shining white.If to no charms thou wilt thy heart resignBut such as merit, such as equal thine,By none, alas, by none thou canst be moved;Phaon alone by Phaon must be loved.Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ;Once in her arms you centred all your joy:No time the dear remembrance can remove,For oh how vast a memory has love!My music then you could for ever hear,And all my words were music to your ear:You stopt with kisses my enchanting tongue,And found my kisses sweeter than my song.In all I pleased, but most in what was best;And the last joy was dearer than the rest:Then with each word, each glance, each motion fired,You still enjoyed, and yet you still desired,Till all dissolving in the trance we lay,And in tumultuous raptures died away.The fair Sicilians now thy soul inflame:Why was I born, ye gods, a Lesbian dame?But ah, beware, Sicilian nymphs, nor boastThat wandering heart which I so lately lost;Nor be with all those tempting words abused:Those tempting words were all to Sappho used.And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains,Have pity, Venus, on your poet's pains.Shall fortune still in one sad tenor runAnd still increase the woes so soon begun?Inured to sorrow from my tender years,My parent's ashes drank my early tears:My brother next, neglecting wealth and fame,Ignobly burned in a destructive flame:An infant daughter late my griefs increased,And all a mother's cares distract my breast.Alas, what more could Fate itself impose,But thee, the last and greatest of my woes?No more my robes in waving purple flow,Nor on my hand the sparkling diamonds glow;No more my locks in ringlets curled diffuseThe costly sweetness of Arabian dews;Nor braids of gold the varied tresses bindThat fly disordered with the wanton wind.For whom should Sappho use such arts as these?He's gone whom only she desired to please!Cupid's light darts my tender bosom move;Still is there cause for Sappho still to love;So from my birth the Sisters fixed my doom,And gave to Venus all my life to come:Or, while my Muse in melting notes complains,My yielding heart keeps measure to my strains.By charms like thine, which all my soul have won,Who might not—ah, who would not be undone?For those, Aurora Cephalus might scorn,And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn:For those, might Cynthia lengthen Phaon's sleep,And bid Endymion nightly tend his sheep:Venus for those had rapt thee to the skies,But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes.O scarce a youth, yet scarce a tender boy!O useful time for lovers to employ!Pride of thy age, and glory of thy race,Come to these arms and melt in this embrace!The vows you never will return, receive;And take at least the love you will not give.See, while I write, my words are lost in tears:The less my sense, the more my love appears.Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu:At least, to feign was never hard to you.'Farewell, my Lesbian love,' you might have said;Or coldly thus, 'Farewell, O Lesbian maid.'No tear did you, no parting kiss receive,Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve.No lover's gift your Sappho could confer;And wrongs and woes were all you left with her.No charge I gave you, and no charge could giveBut this—'Be mindful of our loves, and live.'Now by the Nine, those powers adored by me,And Love, the god that ever waits on thee;—When first I heard (from whom I hardly knew)That you were fled and all my joys with you,Like some sad statue, speechless, pale I stood;Grief chilled my breast and stopt my freezing blood;No sigh to rise, no tear had power to flow,Fixed in a stupid lethargy of woe.But when its way the impetuous passion found,I rend my tresses and my breasts I wound;I rave, then weep; I curse, and then complain;Now swell to rage, now melt in tears again.Not fiercer pangs distract the mournful dameWhose first-born infant feeds the funeral flame.My scornful brother with a smile appears,Insults my woes, and triumphs in my tears;His hated image ever haunts my eyes;—'And why this grief? thy daughter lives,' he cries.Stung with my love and furious with despair,All torn my garments and my bosom bare,My woes, thy crimes, I to the world proclaim;Such inconsistent things are love and shame.'Tis thou art all my care and my delight,My daily longing and my dream by night.—O night, more pleasing than the brightest day,When fancy gives what absence takes away,And, dressed in all its visionary charms,Restores my fair deserter to my arms!Then round your neck in wanton wreath I twine;Then you, methinks, as fondly circle mine:A thousand tender words I hear and speak;A thousand melting kisses give and take:Then fiercer joys; I blush to mention these,Yet, while I blush, confess how much they please.But when with day the sweet delusions fly,And all things wake to life and joy, but I;As if once more forsaken, I complain,And close my eyes to dream of you again:Then frantic rise; and, like some fury, roveThrough lonely plains, and through the silent grove,As if the silent grove and lonely plains,That knew my pleasures, could relieve my pains.I view the grotto, once the scene of love,The rocks around, the hanging roofs above,That charmed me more, with native moss o'ergrown,Than Phrygian marble or the Parian stone:I find the shades that veiled our joys before;But, Phaon gone, those shades delight no more.Here the pressed herbs with bending tops betrayWhere oft entwined in amorous folds we lay;I kiss that earth which once was pressed by you,And all with tears the withering herbs bedew.For thee the fading trees appear to mourn,And birds defer their song till thy return:Night shades the groves, and all in silence lie,—All but the mournful Philomel and I:With mournful Philomel I join my strain;Of Tereus she, of Phaon I complain.A spring there is whose silver waters show,Clear as a glass, the shining sands below:A flowery lotus spreads its arms above,Shades all the banks and seems itself a grove;Eternal greens the mossy margin grace,Watched by the sylvan genius of the place:Here as I lay, and swelled with tears the floodBefore my sight a watery virgin stood:She stood and cried,—'O you that love in vain,Fly hence and seek the fair Leucadian main:There stands a rock from whose impending steepApollo's fane surveys the rolling deep;There injured lovers, leaping from above,Their flames extinguish and forget to love.Deucalion once with hopeless fury burned;In vain he loved, relentless Pyrrha scorned.But when from hence he plunged into the main,Deucalion scorned, and Pyrrha loved in vain.Haste, Sappho, haste, from high Leucadia throwThy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below.'She spoke, and vanished with the voice: I rise,And silent tears fall trickling from my eyes.I go, ye nymphs, those rocks and seas to prove:How much I fear, but ah, how much I love!I go, ye nymphs, where furious love inspires;Let female fears submit to female fires:To rocks and seas I fly from Phaon's hate,And hope from seas and rocks a milder fate.Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow,And softly lay me on the waves below.And thou, kind Love, my sinking limbs sustain,Spread thy soft wings and waft me o'er the main,Nor let a lover's death the guiltless flood profane.On Phoebus' shrine my harp I'll then bestow,And this inscription shall be placed below:—'Here she who sung, to him that did inspire,Sappho to Phoebus consecrates her lyre:What suits with Sappho, Phoebus, suits with thee;The gift, the giver, and the god agree.'But why, alas, relentless youth, ah, whyTo distant seas must tender Sappho fly?Thy charms than those may far more powerful be,And Phoebus' self is less a god to me.Ah, canst thou doom me to the rocks and sea,O far more faithless and more hard than they?Ah, canst thou rather see this tender breastDashed on these rocks that to thy bosom pressed?This breast, which once, in vain! you liked so well;Where the Loves played, and where the Muses dwell.Alas, the Muses now no more inspire:Untuned my lute, and silent is my lyre:My languid numbers have forgot to flow,And fancy sinks beneath the weight of woe.Ye Lesbian virgins and ye Lesbian dames,Themes of my verse and objects of my flames,No more your groves with my glad songs shall ring;No more these hands shall touch the trembling string:My Phaon's fled, and I those arts resign:(Wretch that I am, to call that Phaon mine!)Return, fair youth, return, and bring alongJoy to my soul and vigour to my song.Absent from thee, the poet's flame expires;But ah, how fiercely burn the lover's fires!Gods, can no prayers, no sighs, no numbers moveOne savage heart, or teach it how to love?The winds my prayers, my sighs, my numbers bear;The flying winds have lost them all in air.Or when, alas, shall more auspicious galesTo these fond eyes restore thy welcome sails?If you return, ah, why these long delays?Poor Sappho dies while careless Phaon stays.O launch the bark, nor fear the watery plain:Venus for thee shall smooth her native main.O launch thy bark, secure of prosperous gales:Cupid for thee shall spread the swelling sails.If you will fly—(yet ah, what cause can be,Too cruel youth, that you should fly from me?)If not from Phaon I must hope for ease,Ah, let me seek it from the raging seas:To raging seas unpitied I'll remove;And either cease to live or cease to love.
Say, lovely youth that dost my heart command,
Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?
Must then her name the wretched writer prove,
To thy remembrance lost as to thy love?
Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose,
The lute neglected and the lyric Muse:
Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow,
And tuned my heart to elegies of woe.
I burn, I burn, as when through ripened corn
By driving winds the spreading flames are borne.
Phaon to Aetna's scorching fields retires,
While I consume with more than Aetna's fires.
No more my soul a charm in music finds;
Music has charms alone for peaceful minds:
Soft scenes of solitude no more can please;
Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.
No more the Lesbian dames my passion move,
Once the dear objects of my guilty love:[9]
All other loves are lost in only thine,
Ah, youth ungrateful to a flame like mine!
Whom would not all those blooming charms surprise,
Those heavenly looks and dear deluding eyes?
The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear,
A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear.
Would you with ivy wreathe your flowing hair,
Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare:
Yet Phoebus loved, and Bacchus felt the flame;
One Daphne warmed and one the Cretan dame;
Nymphs that in verse no more could rival me
Than e'en those gods contend in charms with thee.
The Muses teach me all their softest lays,
And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise.
Though great Alcaeus more sublimely sings,
And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings,
No less renown attends the moving lyre
Which Venus tunes and all her Loves inspire.
To me what Nature has in charms denied
Is well by wit's more lasting flames supplied.
Though short my stature, yet my name extends
To heaven itself and earth's remotest ends:
Brown as I am, an Aethiopian dame
Inspired young Perseus with a generous flame:
Turtles and doves of different hue unite,
And glossy jet is paired with shining white.
If to no charms thou wilt thy heart resign
But such as merit, such as equal thine,
By none, alas, by none thou canst be moved;
Phaon alone by Phaon must be loved.
Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ;
Once in her arms you centred all your joy:
No time the dear remembrance can remove,
For oh how vast a memory has love!
My music then you could for ever hear,
And all my words were music to your ear:
You stopt with kisses my enchanting tongue,
And found my kisses sweeter than my song.
In all I pleased, but most in what was best;
And the last joy was dearer than the rest:
Then with each word, each glance, each motion fired,
You still enjoyed, and yet you still desired,
Till all dissolving in the trance we lay,
And in tumultuous raptures died away.
The fair Sicilians now thy soul inflame:
Why was I born, ye gods, a Lesbian dame?
But ah, beware, Sicilian nymphs, nor boast
That wandering heart which I so lately lost;
Nor be with all those tempting words abused:
Those tempting words were all to Sappho used.
And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains,
Have pity, Venus, on your poet's pains.
Shall fortune still in one sad tenor run
And still increase the woes so soon begun?
Inured to sorrow from my tender years,
My parent's ashes drank my early tears:
My brother next, neglecting wealth and fame,
Ignobly burned in a destructive flame:
An infant daughter late my griefs increased,
And all a mother's cares distract my breast.
Alas, what more could Fate itself impose,
But thee, the last and greatest of my woes?
No more my robes in waving purple flow,
Nor on my hand the sparkling diamonds glow;
No more my locks in ringlets curled diffuse
The costly sweetness of Arabian dews;
Nor braids of gold the varied tresses bind
That fly disordered with the wanton wind.
For whom should Sappho use such arts as these?
He's gone whom only she desired to please!
Cupid's light darts my tender bosom move;
Still is there cause for Sappho still to love;
So from my birth the Sisters fixed my doom,
And gave to Venus all my life to come:
Or, while my Muse in melting notes complains,
My yielding heart keeps measure to my strains.
By charms like thine, which all my soul have won,
Who might not—ah, who would not be undone?
For those, Aurora Cephalus might scorn,
And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn:
For those, might Cynthia lengthen Phaon's sleep,
And bid Endymion nightly tend his sheep:
Venus for those had rapt thee to the skies,
But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes.
O scarce a youth, yet scarce a tender boy!
O useful time for lovers to employ!
Pride of thy age, and glory of thy race,
Come to these arms and melt in this embrace!
The vows you never will return, receive;
And take at least the love you will not give.
See, while I write, my words are lost in tears:
The less my sense, the more my love appears.
Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu:
At least, to feign was never hard to you.
'Farewell, my Lesbian love,' you might have said;
Or coldly thus, 'Farewell, O Lesbian maid.'
No tear did you, no parting kiss receive,
Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve.
No lover's gift your Sappho could confer;
And wrongs and woes were all you left with her.
No charge I gave you, and no charge could give
But this—'Be mindful of our loves, and live.'
Now by the Nine, those powers adored by me,
And Love, the god that ever waits on thee;—
When first I heard (from whom I hardly knew)
That you were fled and all my joys with you,
Like some sad statue, speechless, pale I stood;
Grief chilled my breast and stopt my freezing blood;
No sigh to rise, no tear had power to flow,
Fixed in a stupid lethargy of woe.
But when its way the impetuous passion found,
I rend my tresses and my breasts I wound;
I rave, then weep; I curse, and then complain;
Now swell to rage, now melt in tears again.
Not fiercer pangs distract the mournful dame
Whose first-born infant feeds the funeral flame.
My scornful brother with a smile appears,
Insults my woes, and triumphs in my tears;
His hated image ever haunts my eyes;—
'And why this grief? thy daughter lives,' he cries.
Stung with my love and furious with despair,
All torn my garments and my bosom bare,
My woes, thy crimes, I to the world proclaim;
Such inconsistent things are love and shame.
'Tis thou art all my care and my delight,
My daily longing and my dream by night.—
O night, more pleasing than the brightest day,
When fancy gives what absence takes away,
And, dressed in all its visionary charms,
Restores my fair deserter to my arms!
Then round your neck in wanton wreath I twine;
Then you, methinks, as fondly circle mine:
A thousand tender words I hear and speak;
A thousand melting kisses give and take:
Then fiercer joys; I blush to mention these,
Yet, while I blush, confess how much they please.
But when with day the sweet delusions fly,
And all things wake to life and joy, but I;
As if once more forsaken, I complain,
And close my eyes to dream of you again:
Then frantic rise; and, like some fury, rove
Through lonely plains, and through the silent grove,
As if the silent grove and lonely plains,
That knew my pleasures, could relieve my pains.
I view the grotto, once the scene of love,
The rocks around, the hanging roofs above,
That charmed me more, with native moss o'ergrown,
Than Phrygian marble or the Parian stone:
I find the shades that veiled our joys before;
But, Phaon gone, those shades delight no more.
Here the pressed herbs with bending tops betray
Where oft entwined in amorous folds we lay;
I kiss that earth which once was pressed by you,
And all with tears the withering herbs bedew.
For thee the fading trees appear to mourn,
And birds defer their song till thy return:
Night shades the groves, and all in silence lie,—
All but the mournful Philomel and I:
With mournful Philomel I join my strain;
Of Tereus she, of Phaon I complain.
A spring there is whose silver waters show,
Clear as a glass, the shining sands below:
A flowery lotus spreads its arms above,
Shades all the banks and seems itself a grove;
Eternal greens the mossy margin grace,
Watched by the sylvan genius of the place:
Here as I lay, and swelled with tears the flood
Before my sight a watery virgin stood:
She stood and cried,—'O you that love in vain,
Fly hence and seek the fair Leucadian main:
There stands a rock from whose impending steep
Apollo's fane surveys the rolling deep;
There injured lovers, leaping from above,
Their flames extinguish and forget to love.
Deucalion once with hopeless fury burned;
In vain he loved, relentless Pyrrha scorned.
But when from hence he plunged into the main,
Deucalion scorned, and Pyrrha loved in vain.
Haste, Sappho, haste, from high Leucadia throw
Thy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below.'
She spoke, and vanished with the voice: I rise,
And silent tears fall trickling from my eyes.
I go, ye nymphs, those rocks and seas to prove:
How much I fear, but ah, how much I love!
I go, ye nymphs, where furious love inspires;
Let female fears submit to female fires:
To rocks and seas I fly from Phaon's hate,
And hope from seas and rocks a milder fate.
Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow,
And softly lay me on the waves below.
And thou, kind Love, my sinking limbs sustain,
Spread thy soft wings and waft me o'er the main,
Nor let a lover's death the guiltless flood profane.
On Phoebus' shrine my harp I'll then bestow,
And this inscription shall be placed below:—
'Here she who sung, to him that did inspire,
Sappho to Phoebus consecrates her lyre:
What suits with Sappho, Phoebus, suits with thee;
The gift, the giver, and the god agree.'
But why, alas, relentless youth, ah, why
To distant seas must tender Sappho fly?
Thy charms than those may far more powerful be,
And Phoebus' self is less a god to me.
Ah, canst thou doom me to the rocks and sea,
O far more faithless and more hard than they?
Ah, canst thou rather see this tender breast
Dashed on these rocks that to thy bosom pressed?
This breast, which once, in vain! you liked so well;
Where the Loves played, and where the Muses dwell.
Alas, the Muses now no more inspire:
Untuned my lute, and silent is my lyre:
My languid numbers have forgot to flow,
And fancy sinks beneath the weight of woe.
Ye Lesbian virgins and ye Lesbian dames,
Themes of my verse and objects of my flames,
No more your groves with my glad songs shall ring;
No more these hands shall touch the trembling string:
My Phaon's fled, and I those arts resign:
(Wretch that I am, to call that Phaon mine!)
Return, fair youth, return, and bring along
Joy to my soul and vigour to my song.
Absent from thee, the poet's flame expires;
But ah, how fiercely burn the lover's fires!
Gods, can no prayers, no sighs, no numbers move
One savage heart, or teach it how to love?
The winds my prayers, my sighs, my numbers bear;
The flying winds have lost them all in air.
Or when, alas, shall more auspicious gales
To these fond eyes restore thy welcome sails?
If you return, ah, why these long delays?
Poor Sappho dies while careless Phaon stays.
O launch the bark, nor fear the watery plain:
Venus for thee shall smooth her native main.
O launch thy bark, secure of prosperous gales:
Cupid for thee shall spread the swelling sails.
If you will fly—(yet ah, what cause can be,
Too cruel youth, that you should fly from me?)
If not from Phaon I must hope for ease,
Ah, let me seek it from the raging seas:
To raging seas unpitied I'll remove;
And either cease to live or cease to love.