A selection of her poems' fragments
I have not had one word from her
Frankly I wish I were dead
When she left, she wept
a great deal;
she said to me,
"This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly."
I said, "Go, and be happy
but remember (you know well)
whom you leave shackled by love
"If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodit
and all the loveliness that we shared
"all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck
"myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them
"while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song..."
Transl. by Mary Barnard
Please
Come back to me, Gongyla, here tonight,
You, my rose, with your Lydian lyre.
There hovers forever around you delight:
A beauty desired.
Even your garment plunders my eyes.
I am enchanted: I who once
Complained to the Cyprus-born goddess,
Whom I now beseech
Never to let this lose me grace
But rather bring you back to me:
Amongst all mortal women the one
I most wish to see.
Transl. by Paul Roche
To Andromeda
That country girl has witched your wishes,
all dressed up in her country clothes
and she hasn't got the sense
to hitch her rags above her ankles.
Transl. by Jim Powell
Some an army of horsemen, some an army on foot
and some say a fleet of ships is the loveliest sight
on this dark earth; but I say it is what-
ever you desire:
and it it possible to make this perfectly clear
to all; for the woman who far surpassed all others
in her beauty, Helen, left her husband --
the best of all men --
behind and sailed far away to Troy; she did not spare
a single thought for her child nor for her dear parents
but [the goddess of love] led her astray
[to desire...]
[...which]
reminds me now of Anactoria
although far away,
Transl. by Josephine Balmer
To Atthis
Though in Sardis now,
she things of us constantly
and of the life we shared.
She saw you as a goddess
and above all your dancing gave her deep joy.
Now she shines among Lydian women like
the rose-fingered moon
rising after sundown, erasing all
stars around her, and pouring light equally
across the salt sea
and over densely flowered fields
lucent under dew. Her light spreads
on roses and tender thyme
and the blooming honey-lotus.
Often while she wanders she remem-
bers you, gentle Atthis,
and desire eats away at her heart
for us to come.
Transl. by Willis Barnstone
Read some more fragments of Sappho's poems in the following page.
Go to Sappho's page.
| 
