“What Alcibiades and Charmides and Phædrus were to Socrates, Gyrinna and Atthis and Anactoria were to the Lesbian.” Max Tyrius, quoted in H. T. Wharton’s Sappho, p. 23.
To Lesbia
Perhaps the few lines of Sappho, translated or paraphrased by Catullus under the title To Lesbia, form the most celebrated fragment of her extant work. They may be roughly rendered thus:—
“Peer of all the gods unto me appeareth
He of men who sitting beside thee heareth
Close at hand thy syllabled words sweet spoken,
Or loving laughter—
That sweet laugh which flutters my heart and bosom.
For, at sight of thee, in an instant fail me