Quotes from Sappho

for you beautiful ones my thought is not changeable

Eros harrows my heart: wild gales sweeping desolate mountains, uprooting oaks.

Nightingale, All you sing Is desire; You are the crier Of coming spring

I have a daughter who reminds me of A marigold in bloom. Kle

In Ancient Greek literature male poets tend not simply to portray women as lecherous but to attribute to them a species of lust different from that of males: a subhuman and automatic reflex, an animalistic urge. Sappho is important because she gives a fulle human voice to female desire for the first time in Western history. Since she defiantly chooses the quintessential love-object Helen of Troy as her freethinking agent, she seems fully conscious of the revolutionary claim she is making.

Hesperus, you are The most fetching star. What Dawn flings afield You bring back together - Sheep to the fold, goats to the pen, And the child to his mother again. Nightingale, All you sing Is desire; You are the crier Of coming spring

Dawn with arms of roses

Tonight I've watched the moon and then the Pleiades go down The night is now half gone; youth goes; I am in bed alone

We shall enjoy it As for him who finds fault, may silliness and sorrow take him!

Some say thronging cavalry, some say foot soldiers, others call a fleet the most beautiful of sights the dark earth offers, but I say it's what- ever you love best. . . . . But that reminds me: now my Anactória is gone, and I'd rather see her lovely step, her sparkling glance and her face than gaze on all the troops in Lydia in their chariots and glittering armor.

The gorgeous man presents a gorgeous view; The good man will in time be gorgeous, too.

Suddenly Dawn in gold sandals

I use to weave crowns

Wealth without real worthiness Is no good for the neighbourhood; But their proper mixture Is the summit of beatitude.

LXVII INDOORS the fire is kindled; Beechwood is piled on the hearthstone; Cold are the chattering oak-leaves; And the ponds frost-bitten. Softer than rainfall at twilight, Bringing the fields benediction And the hills quiet and greyness, Are my long thoughts of thee. How should thy friend fear the seasons? They only perish of winter Whom Love, audacious and tender, Never hath visited.

Leave Crete and sweep to this blest temple Where apple-orchard's elegance Is yours, and smouldering altars, ample Frankincense. Here under boughs a bracing spring Percolates, roses without number Umber the earth and, rustling, The leaves drip slumber. Here budding flowers possess a sunny Pasture where steeds could graze their fill, And the breeze feels as gentle as honey... Kypris, here in the present blend Your nectar with pure festal glee. Fill gilded bowls and pass them round Lavinshly.

Love shook my heart like a wind falling on oaks on a mountain.

But thou shalt ever lie dead nor shall there be any remembrance of thee then or ever, for thou hast none of the roses of Pieria; but thou shalt wander unnoticed, even in the houses of Hades, flitting among the shadowy dead. Forever shalt thou lie dead, nor shall there be any remembrance of thee now or hereafter, for never has thou had any of the roses of Pieria; but thou shalt wander, eternally unregarded in the houses of Hades, flitting among the insubstantial shades.

I asked myself What, Sappho, can you give one who has everything, like Aphrodite?

Reminded me of Anaktoria, who is gone. I would rather see her lovely step and the motion of light on her face than chariots of Lydians or ranks of footsoldiers in arms.

Gaia, richly crowned, adorns herself in many hues.

Now in my heart I see clearly a beautiful face shining back on me, stained with love

Awed by her splendor Stars near the lovely moon cover their own bright faces when she is roundest and lights earth with her silver

Love-bittersweet, irrepressible-loosens my limbs and i tremble.