GYRINNO
Now the silver crescent
Of the moon has vanished,
With the golden Pleiads
Drifting down the west.
It is after midnight
And the time is passing,
Hours we pledged to passion
And I sleep alone.
Anger ill becomes thee,
Tender-souled Gyrinno,
Shapelier is Dica
But less loved by me.
Art thou still relentless,
Wilful one, annulling
All thy protestations
In the fervid past?
Can it, O Charites,
Be thou hast forgotten?
Dost thou love another,
Even now, perchance?
Ah, my tears are falling,
Yet in my despairing
Mood I lie and listen
For thy furtive step;
For the lightest rustle
Of thy flowing garment,
For thy sweet and panting
Whisper at the door.
Now the moon has vanished
With the golden Pleiads;
It is after midnight
And I sleep alone.
MEGARA
Thou burnest us, Megara,
With thy passions wild;
Bringing from Panormus
Such unbridled fires.
Thou burnest us, a supple
Flow of tortured flame,
Raging, biting, searing,
Lawless of the will.
Thou burnest us, Megara,
Love must know reserve,
Curbing power to keep it
Keener for restraint.
ERINNA
Haughtier than thou, O fair Erinna,
I have never met with any maiden.
Such a careless scorn as thine for passion
Proves a dire affront to Aphrodite.
When with soft desire she wounds thy bosom,
Thou shalt know love's pain and doubly suffer.
Keep the gifts I gave thee, long rejected;
Fabrics for thy lap from far Phocea,
Babylonian unguents, scented sandals,
And the costly mitra for thy tresses;
Tripods worked in brass to flank the altar
With the ivory figure of the Goddess;
Where the sacrificial fumes from sacred
Flames shall rise to gladden and appease her,
In the hour when at her call thy fervid
Breast and mouth to mine shall be relinquished.
GONGYLA
It was when the sunset
Burned with saffron fire,
And Apollo's coursers
Turned below the hills,
That on Mitylene's
Marble bridge we met,
Gongyla, thou golden
Maid of Colophon.
Like the breath of morning
Or a breeze from sea,
Fresh thy beauty smote me,
Virile of the north.
Startled by thy vision,
Transports half divine
Flooded veins and bosom,
Shook me with desire.
Soon the kinder sunglow
Of Æolic lands
Melted all the futile
Snows about thy heart.
DAMOPHYLA
Cold of heart and strangely
Uninclined to passion,
Wisdom's vigil leaves thee,
Proud Damophyla.
Sapphics thou hast written,
Verses in my metre,
With a skill surpassing
In the melic art.
Love's superb enchantment
Thou art fain to banish,
Like the virgin Huntress
Long by thee adored.
Molded by thy tunic,
Every arching contour
Of her chaste and noble
Form I dream to see;
Even view her stepping
From the leafy covert
Down the dawn-white valley,
Stately as a stag.
Long I sued but found thee
Deaf to all entreaty,
Till one summer twilight
Listless in the heat;
Soothed by slumber's languor,
And my low monodic
Voice that hymned a paean
In the praise of love;
Loth to yield yet vanquished,
As I knelt beside thee,
All thy long resistance
To my kiss succumbed.
ANAGORA
Anagora, fairest
Spoil of fateful battle,
Babylonian temples
Knew thy luring song.
Wrested from barbaric
Captors for thy beauty,
Thou wert made a priestess
At Mylitta's shrine.
Once these flexile fingers
Clasped in mine so closely,
Neath the temple's arches
Thrummed the tabor soft.
Thou hast taught me secrets
Of the cryptic chambers,
How the zonahs worship
In the burning East;
Raptures that my wildest
Dreaming never pictured,
Arts of love that charmed me,
Subtle, new and strange.
Hearken to my earnest
Prayer, O Aphrodite!
May the night be doubled
Now for our delight.
$/
PHAON
PHILOMEL
Philomel in my garden,
Messenger sweet of springtide,
From the bough of the olive tree utter
Tidings ecstatic.
Linger long on thy olden
Note as in days remembered;
Ere the Boatman that knew Aphrodite
Ravished my vision.
Fatal glamor of beauty,
Beauty of Gods made mortal;
Ah, before its delight I am ever
Fearful of heaven.
Spring in breeze and the blossom,
Grasses and leaves and odors,
On my heart with the breath of a vanished
April is shaken;
Shaken with thrill and regret of
Lost caresses and kisses;
Anactoria's memory, Atthis
Never forgotten.
Philomel in my garden,
Messenger sweet of springtide,
From the bough of the olive tree utter
Tidings ecstatic.
GOLDEN PULSE
Golden pulse grew on the shore,
Ferns along the hill,
And the red cliff roses bore
Bees to drink their fill;
Bees that from the meadows bring
Wine of melilot,
Honey-sups on golden wing
To the garden grot.
But to me, neglected flower,
Phaon will not see,
Passion brings no crowning hour,
Honey nor the bee.