/i^>^'j-'ii'>v-i?HPr'i'i'i:''";i'r'i:::r.r:j::L;:[:'iJfr,i;i:fy;:i 
 
GIFT OF 
 MICHAEL REESE 
 
SAPPHO, O 
 
 n e 
 
 H 
 
 u n d r e 
 
 d Ly 
 
 r 1 c s 
 
Copyright, 1903, by 
 L. C. Page & Company (Inc.) 
 
 X^F this edition^ five hundred copies were printed^ 
 V^X from type afterwards distributed^ by the T)e 
 Vinne 'Press on antique deckle edge paper in Oc- 
 tober, M^CCCCIIL 
 
 No, 117 
 
 H-SE 
 
THE ^OBT'RY OF Sn<P^HO 
 
 "BF CHARLES G. ©. ^O'BE^TS 
 
 Tf^ F all the poets and all the lovers of poetry 
 I should he asked to name the most precious of 
 -^ the priceless things which time has wrung in 
 tribute from the triumphs of human genius^ the answer 
 which would rush to every tongue would he ^^ The 
 Lost 'Poems of Sappho/^ These we know to have 
 been jewels of a radiance so imperishable that the 
 broken gleams of them still dazzle men^s eyes^ 
 whether shining from the two small brilliants and the 
 handful of star-dust which alone remain to us^ or re- 
 flected merely from the adoration of those poets of 
 old time who were so fortunate as to witness their 
 full glory. 
 
 For about two thousand five hundred years Sappho 
 has held her place as not only the supreme poet 
 of her seXy hut the chief lyrist of all lyrists. Every 
 one who reads acknowledges her fame^ concedes her 
 supremacy ; hut to all except poets and Hellenists 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 her name is a vague and uncomprehended splendour^ 
 rising secure above a persistent mist of misconcep- 
 tion. In spite of all that is in these days being 
 written about Sappho^ it is perhaps not out of place 
 now to inquire^ in a few words^ into the substance of 
 this supremacy which towers so unassailably secure 
 from what appear to be such shadowy foundations, 
 
 First^ we have the witness of her contemporaries, 
 Sappho was at the height of her career about six 
 centuries before Christy at a period when lyric poetry 
 was peculiarly esteemed and cultivated at the centres 
 of Greek life. /Imong the /Bolic peoples of the 
 Isles, in particular, it had been carried to a high 
 pitch of perfection, and its forms had become the 
 subject of assiduous study. Its technique was exact, 
 complex, extremely elaborate, minutely regulated; yet 
 the essential fires of sincerity, spontaneity, imagina- 
 tion, and passion were flaming with undiminished 
 heat behind the fixed forms and restricted measures. 
 The very metropolis of this lyric realm was Mitylene 
 of Lesbos, where, amid the myrtle groves and temples, 
 the sunlit silver of the fountains, the hyacinth gardens 
 by a soft blue sea, beauty and Love in their young 
 
 vi 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 warmth could fuse the most rigid forms to fluency. 
 Here Sappho was the acknowledged queen of song — 
 revered^ studied^ imitated^ served^ adored by a little 
 court of attendants and disciples, loved and hymned 
 by /HcoeuSf and acclaimed by her fellowcraftsmen 
 throughout Greece as the wonder of her age. That 
 all the tributes of her contemporaries show reverence 
 not less for her personality than for her genius is 
 sufficient answer to the calumnies with which the 
 ribald jesters of that later period, the corrupt and 
 shameless writers of /Ithenian comedy, strove to 
 defile her fame. It is sufficient, also, to warrant 
 our regarding the picturesque but scarcely dignified 
 story of her vain pursuit of 'Phaon and her frenzied 
 leap from the Cliff of Leucas as nothing more than 
 a poetic myth, reminiscent, perhaps, of the myth of 
 /Jphrodite and Jldonis — who is, indeed, called 
 Phaon in some versions. The story is further dis- 
 credited by the fact that we find no mention of it in 
 Greek literature — even among those /ittic comedians 
 who would have clutched at it so eagerly and given 
 it so gross a turn — till a date more than two hun- 
 dred years after Sappho^ s death. It is a myth which 
 
INT^O'DUCTION 
 
 has begotten some exquisite literature^ both in prose 
 and verse f from Ovid's famous epistle to /Iddison's 
 gracious fantasy and some impassioned and imper- 
 ishable dithyrambs of Mr. Swinburne '^ but one need 
 not accept the story as fact in order to appreciate the 
 beauties which flowered out from its coloured unreality. 
 The applause of contemporaries ^ however, is not 
 always justified by the verdict of after-times, and does 
 not always secure an immortality of renown. The 
 fame of Sappho has a more stable basis. Her work 
 was in the world's possession for not far short of 
 a thousand years — a thousand years of changing 
 tastes, searching criticism, and familiar use. It had 
 to endure the wear and tear of quotation, the com- 
 monizing touch of the school and the market-place, 
 /ind under this test its glory grew ever more and 
 more conspicuous. Through those thousand years 
 poets and critics vied with one another in proclaim- 
 ing her verse the one unmatched exemplar of lyric 
 art. Such testimony, even though not a single frag- 
 ment remained to us from which to judge her poetry 
 for ourselves, might well convince us that the suprem- 
 acy acknowledged by those who knew all the triumphs 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 of the genius of old Greece was beyond the assault 
 of any modern rival. We might safely accept the 
 sustained judgment of a thousand years of Greece, 
 
 Fortunately for us^ however^ two small but incom- 
 parable odes and a few scintillating fragments have 
 survived^ quoted and handed down in the eulogies of 
 critics and expositors. In these the wisest minds^ 
 the greatest poets^ and the most inspired teachers of 
 modern days have found justification for the unani- 
 mous verdict of antiquity. The tributes of Addison^ 
 Tennyson^ and others^ the throbbing paraphrases and 
 ecstatic interpretations of Swinburne^ are too well 
 known to call for special comment in this brief note ^ 
 but the concise summing up of her genius by Mr, 
 Watts-T)unton in his remarkable essay on poetry is 
 so convincing and illuminating that it seems to de- 
 mand quotation here : ^^ Never before these songs 
 were sung^ and never since^ did the human soul^ in 
 the grip of a fiery passion^ utter a cry like hers; and^ 
 from the executive point of view^ in directness^ in 
 lucidity^ in, that high^ imperious verbal economy 
 which only nature can teach the artist^ she has no 
 equal^ and none worthy to take the place of second,^ ^ 
 
INT'RO^UCTION 
 
 The poems of Sappho so mysteriously lost to us 
 seem to have consisted of at least nine books of 
 odes, together with epithalamia, epigrams, elegies, 
 and monodies. Of the several theories which have 
 been advanced to account for their disappearance, 
 the most plausible seems to be that which represents 
 them as having been burned at Byzantium in the year 
 380 Jlnno Domini, by command of Gregory Nazian- 
 zen, in order that his own poems might be studied in 
 their stead and the morals of the people thereby im- 
 proved. Of the efficacy of this act no means of 
 judging has come down to us. 
 
 In recent years there has arisen a great body of 
 literature upon the subject of Sappho, most of it the 
 abstruse work of scholars writing for scholars, ^ut 
 the gist of it all, together with the minutest sur- 
 viving fragment of her verse, has been made available 
 to the general reader in English by Mr. Henry T. 
 Wharton, in whose altogether admirable little vol- 
 ume we find all that is known and the most apposite 
 of all that has been said up to the present day about 
 
 '* Love's priestess, mad with pain and joy of song. 
 Song's priestess, mad with joy and pain of love." 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 Perhaps the most perilous and the most alluring 
 venture in the whole field of poetry is that which 
 Mr. Carman has undertaken in attempting to give us 
 in English verse those lost poems of Sappho of 
 which fragments have survived. The task is obvi- 
 ously not one of translation or of paraphrasing^ but 
 of imaginative and^ at the same time^ interpretive 
 construction. It is as if a sculptor of to-day were 
 to set himself, with reverence, and trained crafts- 
 manship, and studious familiarity with the spirit, 
 technique, and atmosphere of his subject, to restore 
 some statues of ^olyclitus or Praxiteles of which 
 he had but a broken arm, a foot, a knee, a finger 
 upon which to build, Mr, Carman^ s method, appar- 
 ently, has been to imagine each lost lyric as discov- 
 ered, and then to translate it; for the indefinable 
 flavor of the translation is maintained throughout, 
 though accompanied by the fluidity and freedom of 
 purely original work. 
 
 XI 
 
Now to please my little friend 
 I must make these songs of springs 
 With the soft south-west wind in them 
 Jlnd the marsh notes of the frogs, 
 
 I must take a gold-hound pipe^ 
 /Ind outmatch the bubbling call 
 From the beechwoods in the sunlight, 
 From the meadows in the rain. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Now to please my little friend 
 I Cyprus, Paphos, or Panormus . 
 II What shall we do, Cytherea ? 
 
 III Power and beauty and knowledge . 
 
 IV O Pan of the evergreen forest 
 V O Aphrodite 
 
 VI Peer of the ^ods he seems 
 VII The Cyprian came to thy cradle . 
 
 VIII Aphrodite of the foam 
 
 IX Nay, but always and forever . 
 X Let there be garlands, Dica . 
 XI When the Cretan maidens. 
 XII In a dream I spokewith the Cyprus-born 
 
 XIII Sleep thou in the bosom .... 
 
 XIV Hesperus, bringing together . 
 XV In the grey olive grove a small brown bird 
 
 XVI In the apple boughs the coolness 
 XVII Pale rose leaves have fallen . 
 XVIII The courtyard of her house is wide 
 XIX There is a medlar-tree .... 
 
 xiu 
 
 I 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 6 
 
 8 
 JO tc 
 
 12 
 
 IX. 
 14 
 15 
 
 li-. 
 
 17 
 18 
 
 20 
 21 
 22 
 23 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 XX I behold Arcturus ^oing westward 
 XXI Softly the first step of twilight 
 XXII Once you lay upon my bosom 
 
 XXIII I loved thee, Atthis, in the long ago 
 
 XXIV I shall be ever maiden .... 
 XXV It was summer when I found you 
 
 XXVI I recall thy white gown, cinctured 
 XXVII Lover, art thou of a surety 
 XXVIII With your head thrown backward 
 XXIX Ah, what am I but a torrent . . 
 XXX Love shakes my soul, like a mountain 
 
 wind 
 
 XXXI Love, let the wind cry .... 
 XXXII Heart of mine, if all the altars 
 
 XXXIII Never yet, love, in earth's lifetime 
 
 XXXIV ''Who was Atthis?" men shall ask 
 XXXV When the great pink mallow . . 
 
 XXXVl When I pass thy door at night . 
 XXXVII Well I found you in the twilit garden 
 XXXVIII Will not men remember us 
 XXXIX I grow weary of the foreign cities 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 XL Ah, what detains thee, Phaon . 
 
 XLI Phaon, O my lover 
 
 XLII O heart of insatiable lon^in^ 
 XLIII Surely somehow, in some measure 
 XLIV O but my delicate lover .... 
 XLV Softer than the hill fo^ to the forest 
 
 XLVI I seek and desire 
 
 XLVII Like torn sea-kelp in the drift . 
 XLVIII Fine woven purple linen 
 XLIX When I am home from travel . 
 L When I behold the pharos shine . 
 
 LI Is the day long 
 
 LII Lo, on the distance a dark blue ravine 
 LIII Art thou the topmost apple . 
 LIV How soon will all my lovely days be 
 
 over . 
 
 LV Soul of sorrow, why this weeping ? 
 
 LVI It never can be mine 
 
 LVII Others shall behold the sun . . . 
 LVIII Let thy strong spirit never fear 
 LIX Will none say of Sappho 
 
 47 
 48 
 50 
 51 
 52 
 
 53 
 54 
 55 
 56 
 57 
 58 
 59 
 
 64 
 
 65 
 66 
 67 
 68 
 69 
 70 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LX When I have departed 71 _ 
 
 LXI There is no more to say now thou art 
 
 still 72 
 
 LXII Play up, play up thy silver flute . . 7^ 
 
 LXIII A beautiful child is mine .... 74 
 
 LXIV Ah, but now henceforth 75 
 
 LXV Softly the wind moves through the 
 
 radiant morning 76 
 
 LXVI What the west wind whispers . . . 77 
 
 LXVII Indoors the fire is kindled .... 79 
 LXVIII You ask how love can keep the mortal 
 
 soul 80 
 
 LXIX Like a tall forest were their spears . 82 
 
 LXX My lover smiled, '*0 friend, ask not . 83 
 
 LXXI Ye who have the stable world ... 84 
 
 LXXII I heard the gods reply ,S3__ 
 
 LXXIII The sun on the tide, the peach on the 
 
 bough 86 
 
 LXXIV If death be good 87 
 
 LXXV Tell me what this life means ... 88 
 
 LXXVl Ye have heard how Marsyas ... 89 
 
 xviii 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LXXVII Hour by hour I sit 90 
 
 LXXVIII Once in the shining street ... 91 
 
 LXXIX How strange is love, O my lover . 92 
 
 LXXX How to say I love you . . . . 93 
 
 LXXXI Hark, love, to the tambourines . . 94 
 
 LXXXII Over the roofs the honey-coloured 
 
 moon 95 
 
 LXXXIII In the quiet garden world ... 96 
 
 LXXXI V Soft was the wind in the beech-trees 97 
 LXXXV Have ye heard the news of Sappho's 
 
 garden 98 
 
 LXXXVI Love is so strong a thing . . . lOI 
 LXXXVII Hadst thou with all thy loveliness 
 
 been true 102 
 
 LXXXVIII As on a morn a traveller might 
 
 emerge 1 0^ _ 
 
 LXXXIX Where shall I look for thee . . . lO'i C^tiid 
 XC O sad, sad face and saddest eyes that 
 
 ever 107 
 
 XCI Why have the gods in derision . .109 
 
 XCII Like a red lily in the meadow grasses I I I 
 
 xix 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 XCIII When in the spring the swallows all 
 
 return 112 
 
 XCIV Cold is the wind where Daphne sleeps I 13 
 XCV Hark, where Poseidon's . . . .114 
 XCVI Hark, my lover, it is spring! . . .116 
 XCVII When the early soft spring wind comes 
 
 blowing 119 
 
 XCVIII I am more tremulous than shaken 
 
 reeds 121 
 
 XCIX Over the wheat field 122 
 
 C Once more the rain on the mountain 124 
 
SAPPHO 
 
CYPRUS, Paphos, or Panormus 
 May detain thee with their splendour 
 Of oblations on thine altars, 
 O imperial Aphrodite. 
 
 YET do thou regard, with pity 
 For a nameless child of passion, 
 This small unfrequented valley 
 By the sea, O sea-born mother. 
 
w 
 
 HAT shall we do, Cytherea ? 
 Lovely Adonis is dying. 
 Ah, but we mourn him! 
 
 WILL he return when the Autumn 
 Purples the earth, and the sunlight 
 Sleeps in the vineyard ? 
 
 WILL he return when the Winter 
 Huddles the sheep, and Orion 
 Goes to his hunting? 
 
 AH, for thy beauty, Adonis, 
 ^ With the soft spring and the south wind. 
 Love and desire! 
 
Ill 
 
 POWER and beauty and knowledge,- 
 Pan, Aphrodite, or Hermes, — 
 Whom shall we life-loving mortals 
 Serve and be happy ? 
 
 IO, now your garlanded altars, 
 -^ Are they not goodly with flowers ? 
 Have ye not honour and pleasure 
 In lovely Lesbos ? 
 
 WILL ye not, therefore, a little 
 Hearten, impel, and inspire 
 One who adores, with a favour 
 Threefold in wonder? 
 
IV 
 
 OPan of the evergreen forest, 
 Protector of herds in the meadows, 
 Helper of men at their toiling, — 
 Tillage and harvest and herding, — 
 How many times to frail mortals 
 Hast thou not hearkened ! 
 
 NOW even I come before thee 
 With oil and honey and wheat bread, 
 Praying for strength and fulfilment 
 Of human longing, with purpose 
 Ever to keep thy great worship 
 Pure and undarkened. 
 
 II 
 
 O Hermes, master of knowledge, 
 Measure and number and rhythm. 
 Worker of wonders in metal. 
 Moulder of malleable music. 
 So often the giver of secret 
 Learning to mortals! 
 
Now even I, a fond woman, 
 Frail and of small understanding, 
 Yet with unslakable yearning 
 Greatly desiring wisdom, 
 Come to the threshold of reason 
 And the bright portals. 
 
 Ill 
 And thou, sea-born Aphrodite, 
 l\ In whose beneficent keeping 
 Earth with her infinite beauty. 
 Colour and fashion and fragrance. 
 Glows like a flower with fervour 
 Where woods are vernal ! 
 
 TOUCH with thy lips and enkindle 
 This moon-white delicate body. 
 Drench with the dew of enchantment 
 This mortal one, that I also 
 Grow to the measure of beauty 
 Fleet yet eternal. 
 
V 
 
 O Aphrodite, 
 God-born and deathless, 
 Break not my spirit 
 With bitter anguish, 
 Thou wilful empress! 
 I pray thee, hither! 
 
 As once aforetime 
 i V Well thou didst hearken 
 To my voice far off, — 
 Listen, and leaving 
 Thy father's golden 
 House in yoked chariot, 
 
 COME, thy fleet sparrows 
 Beating the mid-air 
 Over the dark earth. 
 Suddenly near me, 
 Smiling, immortal, 
 Thy bright regard asked. 
 
WHAT had befallen,— 
 Why I had called thee,— 
 What my mad heart then 
 Most was desiring. 
 ''What fair thin^ wouldst thou 
 Lure now to love thee ? 
 
 '' \ X THO wrongs thee, Sappho? 
 V V If now she flies thee. 
 Soon shall she follow; — 
 Scorning thy ^ifts now. 
 Soon be the ^iver; — 
 And a loth loved one 
 
 SOON be the lover." 
 So even now, too, 
 Come and release me 
 From mordant love pain. 
 And all my heart's will 
 Help me accomplish ! 
 
 7 
 
VI 
 
 PEER of the gods he seems, 
 Who in thy presence 
 Sits and hears close to him 
 Thy silver speech-tones 
 And lovely laughter. 
 
 AH, but the heart flutters 
 L Under my bosom, 
 When I behold thee 
 Even a moment; 
 Utterance leaves me; 
 
 M' 
 
 Y tongue is useless; 
 A subtle fire 
 Runs through my body; 
 My eyes are sightless. 
 And my ears ringing ; 
 
I flush with fever, 
 And a strong trembling 
 Lays hold upon me; 
 Paler than grass am I, 
 Half dead for madness. 
 
 YET must I, greatly 
 Daring, adore thee, 
 As the adventurous 
 Sailor makes seaward 
 For the lost sky-line 
 
 AND undiscovered 
 L Fabulous islands, 
 Drawn by the lure of 
 Beauty and summer 
 And the sea's secret. 
 
VII 
 
 THE Cyprian came to thy cradle, 
 When thou wast little and small, 
 And said to the nurse who rocked thee, 
 *' Fear not thou for the child: 
 
 "^ HE shall be kindly favoured, 
 <J And fair and fashioned well, 
 As befits the Lesbian maidens 
 And those who are fated to love." 
 
 HERMES came to thy cradle, 
 Resourceful, sagacious, serene, 
 And said, **The girl must have knowledge. 
 To lend her freedom and poise. 
 
 NAUGHT will avail her beauty, 
 If she have not wit beside. 
 She shall be Hermes' daughter. 
 Passing wise in her day." 
 
 10 
 
GREAT Pan came to thy cradle, 
 With calm of the deepest hills, 
 And smiled, ''They have forgotten 
 The veriest power of life. 
 
 TO kindle her shapely beauty. 
 And illumine her mind withal, 
 I give to the little person 
 The glowing and craving soul/' 
 
 II 
 
VIII 
 
 APHRODITE of the foam, 
 L Who hast ^iven all ^ood ^ifts, 
 And made Sappho at thy will 
 Love so greatly and so much, 
 
 AH, how comes it my frail heart 
 L Is so fond of all things fair, 
 I can never choose between 
 Gor^o and Andromeda? 
 
 12 
 
IX 
 
 NAY, but always and forever 
 Like the bending yellow grain, 
 Or quick water in a channel, 
 Is the heart of man. 
 
 COMES the unseen breath in power 
 Like a great wind from the sea, 
 And we bow before his coming. 
 Though we know not why. 
 
 13 
 
X 
 
 LET there be garlands, Dica, 
 -^ Around thy lovely hair, 
 And supple sprays of blossom 
 Twined by thy soft hands. 
 
 WHOSO is crowned with flowers 
 Has favour with the ^ods, 
 Who have no kindly eyes 
 For the un^arlanded. 
 
 14 
 
XI 
 
 WHEN the Cretan maidens, 
 Dancing up the full moon 
 Round some fair new altar, 
 Trample the soft blossoms of fine ^rass, 
 
 THERE is mirth among them. 
 Aphrodite's children 
 Ask her benediction 
 On their bridals in the summer night. 
 
 15 
 
XII 
 
 IN a dream I spoke with the Cyprus-born, 
 And said to her, 
 ** Mother of beauty, mother of joy, 
 Why hast thou given to men 
 
 THIS thing called love, like the ache of 
 a wound 
 In beauty's side. 
 
 To burn and throb and be quelled for an hour 
 And never wholly depart?" 
 
 AND the daughter of Cyprus said to me, 
 L ^^ Child of the earth. 
 Behold, all things are born and attain. 
 But only as they desire, — 
 
 THE sun that is strong, the gods that are 
 wise. 
 The loving heart. 
 Deeds and knowledge and beauty and joy. 
 
 But before all else was desire." 
 
 16 
 
XIII 
 
 SLEEP thou in the bosom 
 Of the tender comrade, 
 While the living water 
 Whispers in the well-run, 
 And the oleanders 
 Glimmer in the moonlight. 
 
 SOON, ah, soon the shy birds 
 Will be at their fluting, 
 And the morning planet 
 Rise above the garden; 
 For there is a measure 
 Set to all things mortal. 
 
 17 
 
H 
 
 XIV 
 
 ESPERUS, bringing together 
 All that the morning star scattered,- 
 
 S 
 
 HEEP to be folded in twilight, 
 Children for mothers to fondle, — 
 
 M 
 
 E too will bring to the dearest, 
 Tenderest breast in all Lesbos. 
 
 18 
 
XV 
 
 IN the ^rey olive grove a small brown bird 
 Had built her nest and waited for the spring. 
 But who could tell the happy thought that came 
 To lodge beneath my scarlet tunic's fold ? 
 
 ALL day long now is the green earth renewed 
 L With the bright sea-wind and the yellow 
 blossoms. 
 From the cool shade I hear the silver plash 
 Of the blown fountain at the garden's end. 
 
 19 
 
XVI 
 
 IN the apple boughs the coolness 
 Murmurs, and the ^rey leaves flicker 
 Where sleep wanders. 
 
 IN this garden all the hot noon 
 I await thy fluttering footfall 
 Through the twilight. 
 
 20 
 
XVII 
 
 PALE rose leaves have fallen 
 In the fountain water; 
 And soft reedy flute-notes 
 Pierce the sultry quiet. 
 
 BUT I wait and listen, 
 Till the trodden gravel 
 Tells me, all impatience. 
 It is Phaon's footstep. 
 
 21 
 
XVIII 
 
 THE courtyard of her house is wide 
 And cool and still when day departs. 
 Only the rustle of leaves is there 
 And running water. 
 
 AND then her mouth, more delicate 
 L Than the frail wood-anemone, 
 Brushes my cheek, and deeper ^row 
 The purple shadows. 
 
 22 
 
XIX 
 
 THERE is a medlar-tree 
 Growing in front of my lover's house, 
 And there all day 
 The wind makes a pleasant sound. 
 
 AND when the evening comes, 
 L We sit there together in the dusk 
 And watch the stars 
 Appear in the quiet blue. 
 
 23 
 
XX 
 
 I behold Arcturus ^oin^ westward 
 Down the crowded slope of ni^ht-dark azure, 
 While the Scorpion with red Antares 
 Trails along the sea-line to the southward. 
 
 FROM the ilex grove there comes soft 
 laughter, — 
 My companions at their glad love-making, — 
 While that curly-headed boy from Naxos 
 With his jade flute marks the purple quiet. 
 
 24 
 
XXI 
 
 SOFTLY the first step of twilight 
 Falls on the darkening dial, 
 One by one kindle the lights 
 In Mitylene. 
 
 NOISES are hushed in the courtyard, 
 The busy day is departing, 
 Children are called from their games, — 
 Herds from their grazing. 
 
 AND from the deep-shadowed angles 
 ^ Comes the soft murmur of lovers, 
 Then through the quiet of dusk 
 Bright sudden laughter. 
 
 FROM the hushed street, through the portal, 
 Where soon my lover will enter. 
 Comes the pure strain of a flute 
 Tender with passion. 
 
 25 
 
XXII 
 
 ONCE you lay upon my bosom, 
 While the lon^ blue-silver moonlight 
 Walked the plain, with that pure passion 
 All your own. 
 
 NOW the moon is gone, the Pleiads 
 Gone, the dead of night is going. 
 Slips the hour, and on my bed 
 I lie alone. 
 
 26 
 
XXIII 
 
 1 loved thee, Atthis, in the long ago, 
 When the great oleanders were in flower 
 In the broad herded meadows full of sun. 
 And we would often at the fall of dusk 
 Wander together by the silver stream, 
 When the soft grass-heads were all wet with 
 
 dew 
 And purple-misted in the fading light. 
 And joy I knew and sorrow at thy voice, 
 And the superb magnificence of love, — 
 The loneliness that saddens solitude. 
 And the sweet speech that makes it durable,- 
 The bitter longing and the keen desire. 
 The sweet companionship through quiet days 
 In the slow ample beauty of the world. 
 And the unutterable glad release 
 Within the temple of the holy night. 
 O Atthis, how I loved thee long ago 
 In that fair perished summer by the sea! 
 
 27 
 
XXIV 
 
 1 shall be ever maiden, 
 If thou be not my lover, 
 And no man shall possess me 
 Henceforth and forever. 
 
 BUT thou alone shalt gather 
 This fragile flower of beauty, — 
 To crush and keep the fragrance 
 Like a holy incense. 
 
 THOU only shalt remember 
 This love of mine, or hallow 
 The coming years with gladness. 
 Calm and pride and passion. 
 
 28 
 
XXV 
 
 IT was summer when I found you 
 In the meadow long ago, 
 And the golden vetch was growing 
 By the shore. 
 
 DID we falter when love took us 
 With a gust of great desire? 
 Does the barley bid the wind wait 
 In his course? 
 
 29 
 
XXVI 
 
 1 recall thy white ^own, cinctured 
 With a linen belt whereon 
 Violets were wrought, and scented 
 With strange perfumes out of Egypt. 
 
 AND I know thy foot was covered 
 >^ With fair Lydian broidered straps; 
 And the petals from a rose-tree 
 Fell within the marble basin. 
 
 30 
 
XXVII 
 
 EVER, art thou of a surety 
 Not a learner of the wood-^od? 
 Has the madness of his music 
 Never touched thee? 
 
 AH, thou dear and godlike mortal, 
 L If Pan takes thee for his pupil, 
 Make me but another Syrinx 
 For that piping. 
 
 31 
 
XXVII 
 
 WITH your head thrown backward 
 In my arm's safe hollow, 
 And your face all rosy 
 With the mounting fervour; 
 
 WHILE the grave eyes greaten 
 With the wise new wonder, 
 Swimming in a love-mist 
 Like the haze of Autumn; 
 
 FROM that throat, the throbbing 
 Nightingale's for pleading 
 Wayward soft and welling 
 Inarticulate love-notes, 
 
 COME the words that bubble 
 Up through broken laughter. 
 Sweeter than spring water, 
 "Gods, I am so happy!" 
 
 32 
 
XXIX 
 
 AH, what am I but a torrent, 
 - Headstrong, impetuous, broken. 
 Like the spent clamour of waters 
 In the blue canyon ? 
 
 AH, what art thou but a fern-frond, 
 k. Wet with blown spray from the river, 
 Diffident, lovely, sequestered, 
 Frail on the rock-ledge ? 
 
 YET, are we not for one brief day, 
 While the sun sleeps on the mountain, 
 Wild-hearted lover and loved one, 
 Safe in Pan's keeping? 
 
 33 
 
XXX 
 
 LOVE shakes my soul, like a mountain wind 
 -^ Falling upon the trees, 
 When they are swayed and whitened and bowed 
 As the great gusts will. 
 
 I know why Daphne sped through the grove 
 When the bright god came by, 
 And shut herself in the laurel's heart 
 For her silent doom. 
 
 LOVE fills my heart, like my lover's breath 
 ^ Filling the hollow flute, 
 Till the magic wood awakes and cries 
 With remembrance and joy. 
 
 AH, timid Syrinx, do 1 not know 
 L Thy tremor of sweet fear! 
 For a beautiful and imperious player 
 Is the lord of life. 
 
 34 
 
XXXI 
 
 EVE, let the wind cry 
 On the dark mountain, 
 Bending the ash-trees 
 And the tall hemlocks, 
 With the great voice of 
 Thunderous legions, 
 How I adore thee. 
 
 LET the hoarse torrent 
 J In the blue canyon. 
 Murmuring mightily 
 Out of the grey mist 
 Of primal chaos, 
 Cease not proclaiming 
 How I adore thee. 
 
 LET the long rhythm 
 J Of crunching rollers, 
 Breaking and bellowing 
 On the white seaboard, 
 Titan and tireless. 
 Tell while the world stands, 
 How I adore thee. 
 35 
 
LOVE, let the clear call 
 J Of the tree-cricket, 
 Frailest of creatures, 
 Green as the youn^ ^rass, 
 Mark with his trilling 
 Resonant bell-note. 
 How I adore thee. 
 
 LET the glad lark-song 
 J Over the meadow, 
 That melting lyric 
 Of molten silver, 
 Be for a signal 
 To listening mortals, 
 How I adore thee. 
 
 BUT more than all sounds. 
 Surer, serener, 
 Fuller with passion 
 And exultation. 
 Let the hushed whisper 
 In thine own heart say, 
 How I adore thee. 
 36 
 
XXXII 
 
 HEART of mine, if all the altars 
 Of the a^es stood before me, 
 Not one pure enough nor sacred 
 Could I find to lay this white, white 
 Rose of love upon. 
 
 I who am not ^reat enough to 
 Love thee with this mortal body 
 So impassionate with ardour, 
 But oh, not too small to worship 
 While the sun shall shine, — 
 
 1 would build a fragrant temple 
 To thee in the dark green forest, 
 Of red cedar and fine sandal. 
 And there love thee with sweet service 
 All my whole life long. 
 
 37 
 
I would freshen it with flowers, 
 And the piney hill wind through it 
 Should be sweetened with soft fervours 
 Of small prayers in gentle language 
 Thou wouldst smile to hear. 
 
 AND a tinkling Eastern wind-bell, 
 k> With its fluttering inscription, 
 From the rafters with bronze music 
 Should retard the quiet fleeting 
 Of uncounted hours. 
 
 AND my hero, while so human, 
 k. Should be even as the gods are, 
 In that shrine of utter gladness, 
 With the tranquil stars above it 
 And the sea below. 
 
 38 
 
XXXIII 
 
 NEVER yet, love, in earth's lifetime, 
 Hath any cunnin^est minstrel 
 Told the one seventh of wisdom, 
 Ravishment, ecstasy, transport. 
 Hid in the hue of the hyacinth's 
 Purple in springtime. 
 
 NOT in the lyre of Orpheus, 
 Not in the son^s of Musseus, 
 Lurked the unfathomed bewitchment 
 Wrought by the wind in the grasses, 
 Held by the rote of the sea-surf. 
 In early summer. 
 
 ONLY to exquisite lovers, 
 Fashioned for beauty's fulfilment, 
 Mated as rhythm to reed-stop 
 Whence the wild music is moulded. 
 Ever appears the full measure 
 Of the world's wonder. 
 
 39 
 
XXXIV 
 
 WHO was Atthis?" men shall ask, 
 When the world is old, and time 
 Has accomplished without haste 
 The strange destiny of men. 
 
 HAPLY in that far-off age 
 One shall find these silver songs, 
 With their human freight, and guess 
 What a lover Sappho was. 
 
 40 
 
XXXV 
 
 WHEN the great pink mallow 
 Blossoms in the marshland, 
 Full of lazy summer 
 And soft hours, 
 
 THEN I hear the summons 
 Not a mortal lover 
 Ever yet resisted, 
 Strange and far. 
 
 IN the faint blue foothills, 
 Making magic music. 
 Pan is at his love-work 
 On the reeds. 
 
 I can guess the heart-stop. 
 Fall and lull and sequence, 
 Full of grief for Syrinx 
 Long ago. 
 
 41 
 
THEN the crowding madness, 
 Wild and keen and tender. 
 Trembles with the burden 
 Of great joy. 
 
 NAY, but well I follow, 
 All unskilled, that fluting. 
 Never yet was reed-nymph 
 Like to thee. 
 
 42 
 
XXXVI 
 
 WHEN I pass thy door at night, 
 I a benediction breathe: 
 ** Ye who have the sleeping world 
 In your care, 
 
 GUARD the linen sweet and cool, 
 Where a lovely golden head 
 With its dreams of mortal bliss 
 Slumbers now!" 
 
 43 
 
XXXVII 
 
 WELL I found you in the twilit garden, 
 Laid a lover's hand upon your 
 shoulder, 
 And we both were made aware of loving 
 Past the reach of reason to unravel 
 Or the much desiring heart to follow. 
 
 THERE we heard the breath among the 
 grasses 
 And the gurgle of soft-running water, 
 Well contented with the spacious starlight. 
 The cool wind's touch and the deep blue 
 
 distance. 
 Till the dawn came in with golden sandals. 
 
 44 
 
XXXVIII 
 
 WILL not men remember us 
 In the days to come hereafter,- 
 Thy warm-coloured loving beauty 
 And my love for thee? 
 
 THOU, the hyacinth that grows 
 By a quiet-running river; 
 I, the watery reflection 
 And the broken gleam. 
 
 45 
 
XXXIX 
 
 Igrow weary of the foreign cities, 
 The sea travel and the stranger peoples. 
 Even the clear voice of hardy fortune 
 Dares me not as once on brave adventure. 
 
 FOR the heart of man must seek and 
 wander, 
 Ask and question and discover knowledge; 
 Yet above all goodly things is wisdom. 
 And love greater than all understanding. 
 
 SO, a mariner, I long for land-fall, — 
 When a darker purple on the sea-rim, 
 O'er the prow uplifted, shall be Lesbos 
 And the gleaming towers of Mitylene. 
 
 46 
 
XL 
 
 AH, what detains thee, Phaon, 
 . So lon^ from Mitylene, 
 Where now thy restless lover 
 Wearies for thy coming? 
 
 A fever burns me, Phaon; 
 My knees quake on the threshold. 
 And all my strength is loosened, 
 Slack with disappointment. 
 
 BUT thou wilt come, my Phaon, 
 Back from the sea like morning. 
 To quench in golden gladness 
 The ache of parted lovers. 
 
 47 
 
XLI 
 
 F)HAON, O my lover, 
 
 What should so detain thee, 
 
 "K TOW the wind comes walking 
 LL the plum leaves quiver 
 
 Through the leafy twilight 
 
 A 
 
 With the coolth and darkness, 
 
 A FTER their long patience 
 
 K 
 
 In consuming ardour. 
 
 ND the moving grasses 
 
 Have relief; the dew-drench 
 
 /^"^OMES to quell the parching 
 
 I 
 
 Ache of noon they suffered. 
 
 alone of all things 
 
 Fret with unsluiced fire. 
 
 48 
 
AND there is no quenching 
 L In the night for Sappho, 
 
 SINCE her lover Phaon 
 Leaves her unrequited. 
 
 49 
 
XLII 
 
 O heart of insatiable longing, 
 What spell, what enchantment allures 
 thee 
 Over the rim of the world 
 With the sails of the sea-going ships? 
 
 AND when the rose petals are scattered 
 > At dead of still noon on the grass plot, 
 What means this passionate grief, — 
 This infinite ache of regret? 
 
 50 
 
XLIII 
 
 SURELY somehow, in some measure, 
 There will be joy and fulfilment, — 
 Cease from this throb of desire, — 
 Even for Sappho! 
 
 SURELY some fortunate hour 
 Phaon will come, and his beauty 
 Be spent like water to plenish 
 Need of that beauty! 
 
 WHERE is the breath of Poseidon, 
 Cool from the sea-floor with evening? 
 Why are Selene's white horses 
 So long arriving? 
 
 51 
 
XLIV 
 
 Obut my delicate lover, 
 Is she not fair as the moonlight? 
 Is she not supple and strong 
 For hurried passion? 
 
 HAS not the god of the green world, 
 In his large tolerant wisdom, 
 Filled with the ardours of earth 
 Her twenty summers? 
 
 WELL did he make her for loving; 
 Well did he mould her for beauty; 
 Gave her the wish that is brave 
 With understanding. 
 
 OPan, avert from this maiden 
 Sorrow, misfortune, bereavement, 
 Harm, and unhappy regret," 
 Prays one fond mortal. 
 
 52 
 
XLV 
 
 SOFTER than the hill fog to the forest 
 Are the loving hands of my dear lover, 
 When she sleeps beside me in the starlight 
 And her beauty drenches me with rest. 
 
 A 
 
 S the quiet mist enfolds the beech-trees, 
 Even as she dreams her arms enfold 
 
 me, 
 Half awaking with a hundred kisses 
 On the scarlet lily of her mouth. 
 
 53 
 
XLVI 
 
 Iseek and desire, 
 Even as the wind 
 That travels the plain 
 And stirs in the bloom 
 Of the apple-tree. 
 
 I wander through life, 
 With the searching mind 
 That is never at rest, 
 Till I reach the shade 
 Of my lover's door. 
 
 54 
 
XLVII 
 
 ES.E torn sea-kelp in the drift 
 Of the great tides of the sea, 
 Carried past the harbour-mouth 
 To the deep beyond return, 
 
 I am buoyed and borne away 
 On the loveliness of earth, 
 Little caring, save for thee. 
 Past the portals of the night. 
 
 55 
 
XLVIII 
 
 FINE woven purple linen 
 I bring thee from Pboccea, 
 That, beauty upon beauty, 
 A precious gift may cover 
 The lap where I have lain. 
 
 AND a gold comb, and girdle, 
 >^ And trinkets of white silver, 
 And gems are in my sea-chest. 
 Lest poor and empty-handed 
 Thy lover should return. 
 
 AND I have brought from Tyre 
 *^ A Pan-flute stained vermilion, 
 Wherein the gods have hidden 
 Love and desire and longing. 
 Which I shall loose for thee. 
 
 56 
 
XLIX 
 
 WHEN I am home from travel, 
 My ea^er foot will stay not 
 Until I reach the threshold 
 Where I went forth from thee. 
 
 AND there as darkness fathers 
 ^ In the rose-scented garden 
 The ^od who prospers music 
 Shall ^ive me skill to play. 
 
 AND thou shalt hear, all startled, 
 ^ A flute blown in the twilight 
 With the soft pleading ma^ic 
 The ^reen wood heard of old. 
 
 THEN, lamp in hand, thy beauty 
 In the rose-marble entry! 
 And unreluctant Hermes 
 Shall give me words to say. 
 
 57 
 
L 
 
 WHEN I behold the pharos shine 
 And lay a path along the sea, 
 How gladly I shall feel the spray^ 
 Standing upon the swinging prow; 
 
 AND question of my pilot old, 
 L How many watery leagues to sail 
 Ere we shall round the harbour reef 
 And anchor off the wharves of home! 
 
 58 
 
LI 
 
 IS the day lon^, 
 O Lesbian maiden, 
 And the ni^ht endless 
 In thy lone chamber 
 In Mitylene? 
 
 ALL the bright day, 
 L Until welcome evening 
 When the stars kindle 
 Over the harbour, 
 What tasks employ thee? 
 
 PASSING the fountain 
 At golden sundown, 
 One of the home-going 
 Traffickers, hast thou 
 Thought of thy lover? 
 
 59 
 
NAY but how far 
 Too brief will the ni^ht be, 
 When I returning 
 To the dear portal 
 Hear my own heart beat! 
 
 60 
 
LII 
 
 IO, on the distance a dark blue ravine, 
 -^ A fold in the mountainous forests of fir, 
 Cleft from the sky-line sheer down to the 
 shore! 
 
 Above are the clouds and the white 
 1 V pealing gulls, 
 At its foot is the rough broken foam of the 
 
 sea, 
 With ever anon the long deep muffled roar, — 
 A sigh from the fitful great heart of the world. 
 
 THEN inland just where the small meadow 
 begins, 
 Well bulwarked with boulders that jut in the 
 
 tide. 
 Lies safe beyond storm-beat the harbour in 
 sun. 
 
 61 
 
SEE where the black fishing-boats, each at 
 its buoy, 
 Ride up on the swell with their dare-dancer 
 
 prows. 
 To si^ht o'er the sea-rim what venture may 
 come! 
 
 AND look, where the narrow white streets 
 L of the town 
 Lead up from the blue water's edge to the 
 
 wood. 
 Scant room for man's range between mountain 
 
 and sea, 
 And the market where woodsmen from over 
 
 the hill 
 May traffic, and sailors from far foreign ports 
 With treasure brought in from the ends of the 
 
 earth. 
 
 62 
 
AND 
 
 r\ t 
 
 see the third house on the left, with 
 that gleam 
 Of red burnished copper — the hinge of the 
 
 door 
 Whereat I shall enter, expected so oft 
 (Let love be your sea-star!), to voyage no 
 more. 
 
 63 
 
LIII 
 
 ART thou the topmost apple 
 ^ The gatherers could not reach, 
 Reddening on the bough? 
 Shall not I take thee? 
 
 ART thou a hyacinth blossom 
 ^ The shepherds upon the hills 
 Have trodden into the ground? 
 Shall not I lift thee? 
 
 FREE is the young god Eros, 
 Paying no tribute to power, 
 Seeing no evil in beauty, 
 Full of compassion. 
 
 ONCE having found the beloved, 
 However sorry or woeful. 
 However scornful of loving, 
 Little it matters. 
 
 64 
 
LIV 
 
 HOW soon will all my lovely days be 
 over, 
 And I no more be found beneath the sun, — 
 Neither beside the many-murmuring sea. 
 Nor where the plain winds whisper to the reeds, 
 Nor in the tall beech-woods among the hills 
 Where roam the bright-lipped oreads, nor 
 
 along 
 The pasture sides where berry-pickers stray 
 And harmless shepherds pipe their sheep to 
 
 fold! 
 
 FOR I am eager, and the flame of life 
 Burns quickly in the fragile lamp of clay. 
 Passion and love and longing and hot tears 
 Consume this mortal Sappho, and too soon 
 A great wind from the dark will blow upon me, 
 And I be no more found in the fair world. 
 For all the search of the revolving moon 
 And patient shine of everlasting stars. 
 
 65 
 
LV 
 
 SOUL of sorrow, why this weeping? 
 What immortal grief hath touched thee 
 With the poignancy of sadness, — 
 Testament of tears? 
 
 HAVE the high gods deigned to show thee 
 Destiny, and disillusion 
 Fills thy heart at all things human, 
 Fleeting and desired? 
 
 NAY, the gods themselves are fettered 
 By one law which links together 
 Truth and nobleness and beauty, 
 Man and stars and sea. 
 
 AND they only shall find freedom 
 ^ Who with courage rise and follow 
 Where love leads beyond all peril. 
 Wise beyond all words. 
 
 66 
 
LVI 
 
 IT never can be mine 
 To sit in the door in the sun 
 And watch the world ^o by, 
 A pageant and a dream ; 
 
 FOR I was born for love, 
 And fashioned for desire, 
 Beauty, passion, and joy, 
 And sorrow and unrest; 
 
 AND with all things of earth 
 L Eternally must go. 
 Daring the perilous bourn 
 Of joyance and of death, 
 
 A strain of song by night, 
 A shadow on the hill, 
 A hint of odorous grass, 
 A murmur of the sea. 
 
 67 
 
LVII 
 
 OTHERS shall behold the sun 
 Through the lon^ uncounted years,- 
 Not a nnaid in after time 
 Wise as thou. 
 
 FOR the gods have given thee 
 Their best gift, an equal mind 
 That can only love, be glad, 
 And fear not. 
 
 68 
 
LVIII 
 
 LET thy strong spirit never fear, 
 J Nor in thy virgin soul be thou afraid. 
 The gods themselves and the almightier fates 
 Cannot avail to harm 
 
 WITH outward and misfortunate chance 
 The radiant unshaken mind of him 
 Who at his being's centre will abide, 
 Secure from doubt and fear. 
 
 HIS wise and patient heart shall share 
 The strong sweet loveliness of all things 
 made 
 And the serenity of inward joy 
 Beyond the storm of tears. 
 
 69 
 
LIX 
 
 WILL none say of Sappho, 
 Speaking of her lovers, 
 And the love they gave her, — 
 Joy and days and beauty, 
 Flute-playing and roses. 
 Song and wine and laughter, — 
 
 WILL none, musing, murmur, 
 '^Yet for all the roses, 
 All the flutes and lovers, 
 Doubt not she was lonely 
 As the sea, whose cadence 
 Haunts the world forever." 
 
 70 
 
LX 
 
 WHEN I have departed, 
 Say but this behind me, 
 Love was all her wisdom, 
 All her care. 
 
 WELL she kept love's secret,- 
 Dared and never faltered, — 
 Laughed and never doubted 
 Love would win. 
 
 ' T ET the world's rou^h triumph 
 i > Trample by above her, 
 She is safe forever 
 From all harm. 
 
 I 
 
 ** ^ N a land that knows not 
 Bitterness nor sorrow, 
 
 She has found out all 
 Of truth at last." 
 
 71 
 
LXI 
 
 THERE is no more to say now thou art 
 still, 
 There is no more to do now thou art dead, 
 There is no more to know now thy clear mind 
 Is back returned unto the gods who gave it. 
 
 NOW thou art gone the use of life is past, 
 The meaning and the glory and the pride. 
 There is no joyous friend to share the day 
 And on the threshold no awaited shadow. 
 
 72 
 
LXII 
 
 PLAY up, play up thy silver flute; 
 The crickets all are brave; 
 Glad is the red autumnal earth 
 And the blue sea. 
 
 PLAY up thy flawless silver flute; 
 Dead ripe are fruit and ^rain. 
 When Love puts on his scarlet coat, 
 Put off thy care. 
 
 73 
 
LXIII 
 
 A beautiful child is mine, 
 Formed like a golden flower, 
 Cleis the loved one. 
 And above her I value 
 Not all the Lydian land, 
 Nor lovely Hellas. 
 
 74 
 
LXIV 
 
 H, but now henceforth 
 Only one meaning 
 Has life for me. 
 
 K 
 
 ONLY one purport, 
 Measure and beauty, 
 Has the bright world. 
 
 W 
 
 HAT mean the wood-winds, 
 Colour and morning, 
 Bird, stream, and hill? 
 
 A^ 
 
 ND the brave city 
 
 With its enchantment? 
 Thee, only thee. 
 
 75 
 
LXV 
 
 SOFTLY the wind moves through the 
 radiant morning, 
 And the warm sunlight sinks into the valley, 
 Filling the green earth with a quiet joyance, 
 Strength, and fulfilment. 
 
 EVEN so, gentle, strong and wise and happy, 
 Through the soul and substance of my being, 
 Comes the breath of thy great love to meward, 
 O thou dear mortal. 
 
 76 
 
LXVI 
 
 WHAT the west wind whispers 
 At the end of summer, 
 When the barley harvest 
 Ripens to the sickle, 
 Who can tell? 
 
 WHAT means the fine music 
 Of the dry cicada, 
 Through the long noon hours 
 Of the autumn stillness, 
 Who can say? 
 
 HOW the grape ungathered 
 With its bloom of blueness 
 Greatens on the trellis 
 Of the brick-walled garden, 
 Who can know? 
 
 n 
 
YET I, too, am greatened, 
 Keep the note of gladness, 
 Travel by the wind's road. 
 Through this autumn leisure, — 
 By thy love. 
 
 78 
 
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. 
 
 79 
 
LXVIII 
 
 YOU ask bow love can keep the mortal 
 soul 
 Strong to the pitch of joy throughout the years. 
 
 A 
 
 SK how your brave cicada on the bough 
 Keeps the long sweet insistence of bis cry; 
 
 A 
 
 SK bow the Pleiads steer across the night 
 In their serene unswerving mighty course; 
 
 A 
 
 SK bow the wood-flowers waken to the sun, 
 Unsummoned save by some mysterious 
 word; 
 
 ASK bow the wandering swallows find your 
 L eaves, 
 Upon the rain-wind with returning spring; 
 
 80 
 
ASK who commands the ever punctual tide 
 k. To keep the pendulous rhythm of the 
 sea; 
 
 AND you 
 k man 
 
 shall know what leads the heart of 
 man 
 To the far haven of his hopes and fears* 
 
 81 
 
LXIX 
 
 LIKE a tall forest were their spears, 
 J Their banners like a silken sea, 
 When the great host in splendour passed 
 Across the crimson sinking sun. 
 
 AND then the bray of brazen horns 
 I. Arose above their clanking march. 
 As the long waving column filed 
 Into the odorous purple dusk. 
 
 O lover, in this radiant world 
 Whence is the race of mortal men, 
 So frail, so mighty, and so fond. 
 That fleets into the vast unknown? 
 
 82 
 
LXX 
 
 M 
 
 Y lover smiled, **0 friend, ask not 
 The journey's end nor whence we are. 
 
 That whistling boy who minds his ^oats 
 So -idly in the grey ravine. 
 
 T 
 
 HE brown-backed rower drenched with 
 
 spray, 
 
 The lemon-seller in the street. 
 And the young girl who keeps her first 
 Wild love-tryst at the rising moon, — 
 
 LO, these are wiser than the wise. 
 ^ And not for all our questioning 
 Shall we discover more than joy. 
 Nor find a better thing than love! 
 
 ' T ET pass the banners and the spears, 
 L/ The hate, the battle, and the greed; 
 For greater than all gifts is peace. 
 
 And strength is in the tranquil mind.'' 
 
 83 
 
LXXI 
 
 YE who have the stable world 
 In the keeping of your hands, 
 Flocks and men, the lasting hills. 
 And the ever-wheeling stars; 
 
 YE who freight with wondrous things 
 The wide-wandering heart of man 
 And the galleon of the moon, 
 On those silent seas of foam; 
 
 OH, if ever ye shall grant 
 Time and place and room enough 
 To this fond and fragile heart 
 Stifled with the throb of love, 
 
 ON that day one grave-eyed Fate, 
 Pausing in her toil, shall say, 
 " Lo, one mortal has achieved 
 Immortality of love!" 
 
 84 
 
LXXII 
 
 I heard the gods reply: 
 ^* Trust not the future with its perilous 
 chance; 
 The fortunate hour is on the dial now. 
 
 TO-DAY be wise and great, 
 And put off hesitation and go forth 
 With cheerful courage for the diurnal need. 
 
 STOUT be the heart, nor slow 
 The foot to follow the impetuous will, 
 Nor the hand slack upon the loom of deeds. 
 
 THEN may the Fates look up 
 And smile a little in their tolerant way. 
 Being full of infinite regard for men.*' 
 
 85 
 
LXXIII 
 
 THE sun on the tide, the peach on the bough, 
 The blue smoke over the hill, 
 And the shadows trailing the valley-side. 
 Make up the autumn day. 
 
 AH, no, not half! Thou art not here 
 L Under the bronze beech leaves. 
 And thy lover's soul like a lonely child 
 Roams through an empty room. 
 
 86 
 
LXXIV 
 
 IF death be ^ood, 
 Why do the gods not die? 
 If life be ill, 
 Why do the gods still live? 
 
 IF love be naught, 
 Why do the gods still love? 
 If love be all, 
 What should men do but love? 
 
 87 
 
LXXV 
 
 TELL me what this life means, 
 O my prince and lover, 
 With the autumn sunlight 
 On thy bronze-gold head? 
 
 WITH thy clear voice sounding 
 Through the silver twilight, — 
 What is the lost secret 
 Of the tacit earth? 
 
 88 
 
LXXVI 
 
 E have heard how Marsyas, ' ' 
 
 In the folly of his pride, 
 Boasted of a matchless skill, — 
 When the ^reat ^od's back was turned; 
 
 HOW his fond ima^inin^ 
 Fell to ashes cold and ^rey, 
 When the flawless player came 
 In serenity and li^ht. 
 
 SO it was with those I loved 
 In the years ere I loved thee. 
 Many a saying sounds like truth, 
 Until Truth itself is heard. 
 
 M 
 
 ANY a beauty only lives 
 Until Beauty passes by, 
 And the mortal is forgot 
 In the shadow of the god. 
 
 89 
 
LXXVII 
 
 HOUR by hour I sit, 
 Watching the silent door. 
 Shadows go by on the wall, 
 And steps in the street. 
 
 EXPECTATION and doubt 
 Flutter my timorous heart. 
 So many hurrying home — 
 And thou still away. 
 
 90 
 
LXXVIII 
 
 ONCE in the shining street, 
 In the heart of a seaboard town, 
 As I waited, behold, there came 
 The woman I loved. 
 
 AS when in the early spring 
 k. A daffodil blooms in the grass, 
 Golden and gracious and glad, 
 The solitude smiled. 
 
 91 
 
LXXIX 
 
 HOW strange is love, O my lover! 
 With what enchantment and power 
 Does it not come upon mortals, 
 Learned or heedless ! 
 
 HOW far away and unreal, 
 Faint as blue isles in a sunset 
 Haze-Golden, all else of life seems, 
 Since I have known thee! 
 
 92 
 
LXXX 
 
 HOW to say I love you: 
 What, if I but live it, 
 Were the use in that, love ? 
 Small, indeed. 
 
 ONLY, every moment 
 Of this waking lifetime, 
 Let me be your lover 
 And your friend ! 
 
 AH, but then, as sure as 
 ^ Blossom breaks from bud-sheath. 
 When along the hillside 
 Spring returns, 
 
 GOLDEN speech should flower 
 From the soul so cherished 
 And the mouth your kisses 
 Filled with fire. 
 
 93 
 
LXXXI 
 
 HARK, love, to the tambourines 
 Of the minstrels in the street, 
 And one voice that throbs and soars 
 Clear above the clashing time! 
 
 SOME Egyptian royal love-lilt. 
 Some Sidonian refrain, 
 Vows of Paphos or of Tyre, 
 Mount against the silver sun. 
 
 PLEADING, piercing, yet serene, 
 Vagrant in a foreign town, 
 From what passion was it born. 
 In what lost land over sea? 
 
 94 
 
o 
 
 LXXXII 
 
 VER the roofs the honey-coloured moon, 
 With purple shadows on the silver ^rass, 
 
 A' 
 
 ND the warm south wind on the curving sea, 
 While we two, lovers past all turmoil now. 
 
 W 
 
 ATCH from the window the white sails 
 come in. 
 Bearing what unknown ventures safe to port ! 
 
 S 
 
 O falls the hour of twilight and of love 
 With wizardry to loose the hearts of men. 
 
 A 
 
 ND there is nothing more in this ^reat 
 world 
 Than thou and I and the blue dome of dusk. 
 
 95 
 
LXXXIII 
 
 IN the quiet garden world, 
 Gold sunlight and shadow leaves 
 Flicker on the wall. 
 
 AND the wind a moment since 
 L With rose-petals strewed the path 
 And the open door. 
 
 NOW the moon-white butterflies 
 Float across the liquid air, 
 Glad as in a dream; 
 
 AND across thy lover's heart 
 L Visions of one scarlet mouth 
 With its maddening smile. 
 
 96 
 
LXXXIV 
 
 SOFT was the wind in the beech-trees; 
 Low was the surf on the shore; 
 In the blue dusk one planet 
 Like a ^reat sea-pharos shone. 
 
 BUT nothing to me were the sea-sounds, 
 The wind and the yellow star, 
 When over my breast the banner 
 Of your golden hair was spread. 
 
 97 
 
LXXXV 
 
 HAVE ye heard the news of Sappho's 
 garden 
 And the Golden Rose of Mitylene, 
 Which the bending brown-armed rowers lately 
 Brought from over sea, from lonely Pontus? 
 
 IN a meadow by the river Halys, 
 Where some wood-god hath the world in 
 keeping, 
 On a burning summer noon they found her. 
 Lovely as a dryad and more tender. 
 
 HER these eyes have seen, and not another 
 Shall behold, till time takes all things 
 goodly. 
 So surpassing fair and fond and wondrous, — 
 Such a slave as, worth a great king's ransom. 
 
 98 
 
No man yet of all the sons of mortals 
 But would lose his soul for and regret 
 not; 
 So hath Beauty compassed all her children 
 With the cords of longing and desire. 
 
 ONLY Hermes, master of word music, 
 Ever yet in glory of gold language 
 Could ensphere the magical remembrance 
 Of her melting, half sad, wayward beauty, 
 
 OR devise the silver phrase to frame her, 
 The inevitable name to call her, 
 Half a sigh and half a kiss when whispered. 
 Like pure air that feeds a forge's hunger. 
 
 NOT a painter in the Isles of Hellas 
 Could portray her, mix the golden tawny 
 With bright stain of poppies, or ensanguine 
 Like the life her darling mouth's vermilion, 
 
 99 
 
So that in the a^es lon^ hereafter, 
 When we shall be dust of perished 
 summers, 
 Any man could say who found that likeness, 
 Smiling ^^ri^ly o^^ it, ** This was Gorgo!" 
 
 100 
 
LXXXVI 
 
 LOVE is so strong a thing, 
 -/ The very gods must yield, 
 When it is welded fast 
 With the unflinching truth. 
 
 LOVE is so frail a thing, 
 ^ A word, a look, will kill. 
 O lovers, have a care 
 How ye do deal with love. 
 
 lOI 
 
LXXXVII 
 
 HADST thou with all thy loveliness been true, 
 Had I with all my tenderness been strong, 
 We had not made this ruin out of life, 
 This desolation in a world of joy, 
 My poor Gorgo. 
 
 YET even the high gods at times do err; 
 Be therefore thou not overcome with woe, 
 But dedicate anew to greater love 
 An equal heart, and be thy radiant self 
 Once more, Gorgo. 
 
 102 
 
LXXXVIII 
 
 AS on a morn a traveller mi^ht emerge 
 L From the deep green seclusion of the hills, 
 By a cool road through forest and through fern, 
 Little frequented, winding, followed long 
 With joyous expectation and day-dreams. 
 And on a sudden turning a great rock 
 Covered with frondage, dark with dripping water. 
 Behold the seaboard full of surf and sound. 
 With all the space and glory of the world 
 Above the burnished silver of the sea, — 
 
 103 
 
EVEN so it was upon that first spring day 
 When time that is a devious path for men 
 Led me all lonely to thy door at last; 
 And all thy splendid beauty gracious and glad 
 (Glad as bright colour, free as wind or air, 
 And lovelier than racing seas of foam) 
 Bore sense and soul and mind at once away 
 To a pure region where the gods might dwell, 
 Making of me, a vagrant child before, 
 A servant of joy at Aphrodite's will. 
 
 104 
 
LXXXIX 
 
 HERE shall I look for thee, 
 Where find thee now, 
 O my lost Atthis? 
 
 W 
 
 s 
 
 TORM bars the harbour. 
 And snow keeps the pass 
 
 In the blue mountains. 
 
 B 
 
 ITTER the wind whistles. 
 Pale is the sun. 
 And the days shorten. 
 
 CLOSE to the hearthstone, 
 With long thoughts of thee, 
 Thy lonely lover 
 
 ITS now, remembering 
 All the spent hours 
 
 S 
 
 And thy fair beauty 
 
 105 
 
AH, when the hyacinth 
 ^ Wakens with spring, 
 And buds the laurel, 
 
 DOUBT not, some morning 
 When all earth revives, 
 Hearing Pan's flute-call 
 
 OVER the river-beds, 
 Over the hills. 
 Sounding the summons, 
 
 I shall look up and behold 
 In the door, 
 Smiling, expectant, 
 
 LOVING as ever 
 ^ And glad as of old. 
 My own lost Atthis! 
 
 106 
 
xc 
 
 sad, sad face and saddest eyes that ever 
 Beheld the sun, 
 Whence came the grief that makes of all thy 
 
 beauty 
 One sad sweet smile ? 
 
 O 
 
 I 
 
 N this bright portrait where the painter fixed 
 
 them 
 I still behold 
 The eyes that gladdened and the lips that loved 
 
 me. 
 And, gold on rose, 
 
 THE cloud of hair that settles on one 
 shoulder 
 Slipped from its vest. 
 I almost hear thy Mitylenean love-song 
 In the spring night, 
 
 107 
 
w 
 
 HEN the still air was odorous with 
 blossoms 
 And in the hour 
 
 Thy first wild ^irl's-love trembled into bein^, 
 Glad, ^lad and fond. 
 
 A^ 
 
 H, where is all that wonder? What God's 
 malice 
 Undid that joy 
 
 And set the seal of patient woe upon thee, 
 O my lost love ? 
 
 108 
 
XCI 
 
 WHY have the gods in derision 
 Severed us, heart of my being ? 
 Where have they lured thee to wander, 
 O my lost lover ? 
 
 WHILE now I sojourn with sorrow. 
 Having remorse for my comrade, 
 What town is blessed with thy beauty. 
 Gladdened and prospered ? 
 
 NAY, who could love as I loved thee. 
 With whom thy beauty was mingled 
 In those spring days when the swallows 
 Came with the south wind ? 
 
 THEN I became as that shepherd 
 Loved by Selene on Latmus, 
 Once when her own summer magic 
 Took hold upon her 
 
 109 
 
WITH a sweet madness, and 
 thenceforth 
 Her mortal lover must wander 
 Over the wide world forever, 
 Like one enchanted. 
 
 no 
 
XCII 
 
 LIKE a red lily in the meadow grasses, 
 J Swayed by the wind and burning in the 
 sunlight, 
 I saw you where the city chokes with traffic 
 Bearing among the passers-by your beauty, 
 Unsullied, wild, and delicate as a flower. 
 And then I knew past doubt or peradventure 
 Our loved and mighty Eleusinian mother 
 Had taken thought of me for her pure worship, 
 And of her favour had assigned my comrade 
 For the Great Mysteries, — knew I should find 
 
 you 
 When the dusk murmured with its new-made 
 
 lovers, 
 And we be no more foolish but wise children 
 And well content partake of joy together. 
 As she ordains and human hearts desire. 
 
 Ill 
 
XCIII 
 
 WHEN in the spring the swallows all 
 return, 
 And the bleak bitter sea grows mild once more, 
 With all its thunders softened to a sigh ; 
 
 WHEN to the meadows the young green 
 comes back, 
 And swelling buds put forth on every bough, 
 With wild-wood odours on the delicate air; 
 
 AH, then, in that so lovely earth wilt thou 
 . With all thy beauty love me all one way. 
 And make me all thy lover as before ? 
 
 LO, where the white-maned horses of the 
 -/ surge. 
 Plunging in thunderous onset to the shore. 
 Trample and break and charge along the sand ! 
 
 112 
 
XCIV 
 
 COLD is the wind where Daphne sleeps, 
 That was so tender and so warm 
 With loving, — with a loveliness 
 Than her own laurel lovelier. 
 
 NOW pipes the bitter wind for her, 
 And the snow sifts about her door, 
 While far below her frosty hill 
 The racing billows plunge and boom. 
 
 113 
 
xcv 
 
 HARK, where Poseidon's 
 White racing horses 
 Trample with tumult 
 The shelving seaboard! 
 
 OLDER than Saturn, 
 Older than Rhea, 
 That mournful music. 
 Falling and surging 
 
 WITH the vast rhythm 
 Ceaseless, eternll, 
 Keeps the long tally 
 Of all things mortal. 
 
 HOW many lovers 
 Hath not its lulling 
 Cradled to slumber 
 With the ripe flowers, 
 
 114 
 
ERE for our pleasure 
 This golden summer 
 Walked through the corn-lands 
 In gracious splendour! 
 
 HOW many loved ones 
 Will it not croon to^ 
 In the long spring days 
 Through coming ages, 
 
 WHEN all our day-dreams 
 Have been forgotten, 
 And none remembers 
 Even thy beauty! 
 
 THEY too shall slumber 
 In quiet places, 
 And mighty sea-sounds 
 Call them unheeded. 
 
 115 
 
XCVI 
 
 HARK, my lover, it is spring! 
 On the wind a faint far call 
 Wakes a pang within my heart, 
 Unmistakable and keen. 
 
 AT the harbour mouth a sail 
 L Glimmers in the morning sun, 
 And the ripples at her prow 
 Whiten into crumbling foam, 
 
 AS she forges outward bound 
 L For the teeming foreign ports. 
 Through the open window now, 
 Hear the sailors lift a song! 
 
 IN the meadow ground the frogs 
 With their deafening flutes begin,- 
 Tbe old madness of the world 
 In their golden throats again. 
 
 116 
 
LITTLE fifers of live bronze, 
 J Who hath taught you with wise lore 
 To unloose the strains of joy, 
 When Orion seeks the west? 
 
 AND you feathered flute-players, 
 L Who instructed you to fill 
 All the blossomy orchards now 
 With melodious desire? 
 
 I doubt not our father Pan 
 Hath a care of all these things. 
 In some valley of the hills 
 Far away and misty-blue, 
 
 BY quick water he hath cut 
 A new pipe, and set the wood 
 To his smiling lips, and blown. 
 That earth's rapture be restored. 
 
 117 
 
AND those wild Pandean stops 
 k Mark the cadence life must keep. 
 O my lover, be thou ^lad; 
 It is spring in Hellas now. 
 
 118 
 
XCVII 
 
 WHEN the early soft spring wind comes 
 blowing 
 Over Rhodes and Samos and Miletus, 
 From the seven mouths of Nile to Lesbos, 
 Freighted with sea-odours and gold sunshine, 
 
 WHAT news spreads among the island 
 people 
 In the market-place of Mitylene, 
 Lending that unwonted stir of gladness 
 To the busy streets and thronging doorways? 
 
 IS it word from Ninus or Arbela, 
 Babylon the great, or Northern Imbros? 
 Have the laden galleons been sighted 
 Stoutly labouring up the sea from Tyre? 
 
 119 
 
NAY, 't is older news that foreign sailor 
 With the cheek of sea-tan stops to prattle 
 To the youn^ fi^-seller with her basket 
 And the breasts that bud beneath her tunic. 
 
 AND I hear it in the rustling tree-tops. 
 L All this passionate bright tender body 
 Quivers like a leaf the wind has shaken, 
 Now love wanders through the aisles of 
 springtime. 
 
 120 
 
I 
 
 XCVIII 
 
 am more tremulous than shaken reeds, 
 
 And love has made me like the river water. 
 
 T 
 
 HY voice is as the hill wind over me, 
 And all my chan^in^ heart ^ives heed, my 
 lover. 
 
 BEFORE thy least lost murmur I must 
 sigh, 
 Or gladden with thee as the sun-path glitters. 
 
 121 
 
XCIX 
 
 OVER the wheat field, 
 Over the hill-crest, 
 Swoops and is ^one 
 The beat of a wild wing. 
 Brushing the pine-tops, 
 Bending the poppies. 
 Hurrying Northward 
 With golden summer. 
 
 WHAT premonition, 
 O purple swallow. 
 Told thee the happy 
 Hour of migration? 
 Hark! On the threshold 
 (Hush, flurried heart in me!). 
 Was there a footfall? 
 Did no one enter? 
 
 122 
 
SOON will a shepherd 
 In ru^^ed Dacia, 
 Folding his gentle 
 Ewes in the twilight, 
 Lifting a level 
 Gaze from the sheepfold, 
 Say to his fellow, 
 *^ Lo, it is springtime/' 
 
 THIS very hour 
 In Mitylene, 
 Will not a young girl 
 Say to her lover, 
 Lifting her moon-white 
 Arms to enlace him, 
 Ere the glad sigh comes, 
 *' Lo, it is lovetime! " 
 
 123 
 
ONCE more the rain on the mountain, 
 Once more the wind in the valley, 
 With the soft odours of springtime 
 And the lon^ breath of remembrance, 
 O Lityerses! 
 
 WARM is the sun in the city. 
 On the street corners with laughter 
 Traffic the flower-girls. Beauty 
 Blossoms once more for thy pleasure 
 
 In many places. 
 
 GENTLIER now falls the twilight. 
 With the slim moon in the pear-trees; 
 And the green frogs in the meadows 
 Blow on shrill pipes to awaken 
 Thee, Lityerses. 
 
 124 
 
GLADLIER now crimson morning 
 Flushes fair-built Mitylene, — 
 Portico, temple, and column, — 
 Where the youn^ garlanded women 
 Praise thee with singing. 
 
 AH, but what burden of sorrow 
 L Tinges their slow stately chorus. 
 Though spring revisits the glad earth? 
 Wilt thou not wake to their summons, 
 O Lityerses? 
 
 SHALL they then never behold thee,- 
 Nevermore see thee returning 
 Down the blue cleft of the mountains. 
 Nor in the purple of evening 
 Welcome thy coming? 
 
 125 
 
NEVERMORE answer thy flowing 
 Youth with their ardour, nor cherish 
 With lovely longing thy spirit, 
 Nor with soft laughter beguile thee, 
 O Lityerses ? 
 
 HEEDLESS, assuaged, art thou sleeping 
 Where the spring sun cannot find thee. 
 Nor the wind waken, nor woodlands 
 Bloom for thy innocent rapture 
 Through golden hours? 
 
 HAST thou no passion nor pity 
 For thy deserted companions? 
 Never again will thy beauty 
 Quell their desire nor rekindle, 
 O Lityerses? 
 
 126 
 
NAY, but in vain their clear voices 
 Call thee. Thy sensitive beauty 
 Is become part of the fleeting 
 Loveliness, merged in the pathos 
 Of all things mortal. 
 
 IN the faint fragrance of flowers, 
 On the sweet draft of the sea-wind, 
 Linger strange hints now that loosen 
 Tears for thy gay gentle spirit, 
 O Lityerses ! 
 
 127 
 
A T OZV the hundred songs are made^ 
 J. y /Ind the pause comes. Loving Heart, 
 There must he an end to summer, 
 /Ind the flute be laid aside, 
 
 ON a day the frost will come. 
 Walking through the autumn world, 
 Hushing all the brave endeavour 
 Of the crickets in the grass, 
 
 ON a day {Oh, far from now!) 
 Earth will hear this voice no more; 
 For it shall be with thy lover 
 Jls with Linus long ago* 
 
 ^^LL the happy songs he wrought 
 J JL From remembrance soon must fade, 
 Jls the wash of silver moonlight 
 From a purple-dark ravine. 
 
 128 
 
F^/IIL as dew upon the grass 
 Or the spindrift of the sea^ 
 Out of nothing they were fashioned 
 And to nothing must return, 
 
 T^T-^^f ^"^ something of thy love^ 
 
 -/ V ^assion^ tenderness^ and joy^ 
 Some strange magic of thy beauty^ 
 Some sweet pathos of thy tears, 
 
 MUST imperishahly cling 
 To the cadence of the words. 
 Like a spell of lost enchantments 
 Laid upon the hearts of men, 
 
 CT f) \ILT> and fleeting as the notes 
 v.J^X 'Blown upon a woodland pipe, 
 They must haunt the earth with gladness 
 And a tinge of old regret. 
 
 129 
 
FO^ the transport in their rhythm 
 Was the throb of thy desire^ 
 /ind thy lyric moods shall quicken 
 Souls of lovers yet unborn. 
 
 CT^ /) \HBN the golden days arrive^ 
 Vx'^/ ZVith the swallow at the eaves^ 
 /Ind the first sob of the south wind 
 Sighing at the latch with spring, 
 
 T ONG hereafter shall thy name 
 X.^ 'Be recalled through foreign lands, 
 /ind thou be a part of sorrow 
 When the Linus songs are sung. 
 
 130 
 

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