The Great Mirror of Same-Sex Love - Poetry - 62. ...of salt and flowers...

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Renée Vivien –

Poems Based on Sappho Fragments [i]

 

 

Invocation

 

Our eyes turned forever towards past splendors,

We evoke the fear, the pain and the torment

Of your kisses, softer than hyacinth honey,

Lover who arrogantly pours

Like one pours valerian and balm and myrrh

Before Aphrodite, Mistress of Love,

The tempest and lightning of your lyre,

Oh, Sappho of Lesbos!

 

The eager centuries lean forward to hear

The fragments of your songs. Your face is like

Winter roses found in the cinders,

And your wedding—bed ignores the sun.

Your hair falls with the ebb and flow of the sea

Like the sea algae and the somber coral

And your desperate lips

Drink the peace of the waters.

 

What does the Poet’s praise matter to you,

Whose noble face is weary of eternities?

What does the echo of uneasy verses matter,

The dazzlements and the sonorities?

The music of the tides has filled your ears,

Those ocean whirlpools that murmur to her dead

Words whose rhythm slumbers

Like so many grave harmonies. [ii]

 

 

 

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Sunrise On The Sea

 

. . . as for my sobbing: let the stormy

winds carry it away for all suffering!

—Sappho

 

Momentary pain, I disdain you at last.

I have lifted up my head. I have ceased to weep.

My soul is delivered, and your negligible ghost

No longer comes to graze it on nights of no sleep.

 

At the dawn which violates I smile today.

Without flower fragrance, oh wind of the enormous sea

Whose sharp odor of salt revives the force in me,

Oh wind of the wide sea, carry sorrows away.

 

Forever! Sweep sorrow into distance with a mighty blow

Of your wing, so that happiness will flare forth, triumphal,

In our hearts wherein divine pride springs anew,

Hearts turned toward the sun, song, and the ideal! [iii]

 

•    •    •   

 

 

Gurinnô

 

. . . Mnasidika is more beautiful

than the tender Gurinnô.

—Sappho

 

Gurinnô who weeps in the dark of my porch

Has none of your charms where Eros comes and sings,

Oh Mnasidika! Nor the splendid pride

Of your lover’s breasts.

 

She has none of the melted gold of your glance,

Nor the purple flower of your closed eyelids,

Nor your flesh where amber and myrrh and valerian

Perfume the roses.

 

But she has known a stern voluptuousness,

The fear of love and the shadows coming on.

One night I drank unwillingly

From her bitter lips. [iv]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

All is White

 

The stars around the beautiful

moon veil their clear faces as

soon as, in her plenty, she

illumines the earth with silver

glows.

—Sappho

 

All is white, the moon offers her abundance,

At her feet whines the tormented ocean:

Serene, she sees the flowering of solitude

And chastity.

 

The stars, before the divine Selene,

Have veiled their faces, and the clearness, snowing

From the virgin clear sky, illumines

The silver earth. [v]

 

•    •    •

 

 

I Will Stay a Virgin

 

I will always remain virgin [from man].

—Sappho

 

I will stay virgin like snow

Serene, sleeping white,

Sleeping pale, that the winter protects

From the brutal sun.

 

Like the river water and the North Wind

I will not know stains and foot prints.

I will escape the horrible embrace,

And the corroding kiss.

 

I will stay virgin like the moon

Reflected in the glass tide,

Troubled by the long sigh of desire

For the ocean. [vi]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

[The Evening Makes Flower]

 

I loved you, Atthis, long ago.

—Sappho

 

 

The evening makes flower again[st] faded delights,

The reflection of your eyes, the tone of your voice,

through my tears . . . .

I loved you, Atthis, other days and nights,

The length of the distant years. [vii]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

[The Troubled Water Reflects]

 

. . . you forget me . . .

—Sappho

 

The troubled water reflects, like a vain looking-glass,

My pallid eyelids, my eyes too dull for gleams.

I listen to your laugh and your voice in the evening as you pass.

Atthis, you have forgotten our dreams.

 

You have never known, of love, the warm lethargy,

The terror of the kiss, nor known the pride of hate;

You have wanted only the roses of a day from me,

Uncertain love for whom I wait. [viii]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

[You Despise my Thought]

 

At this, my thought is detestable to

you, and you flee toward Andromeda.

—Sappho

 

You despise my thought, At this, and my image.

This other kiss, which persuades you from me,

Inflames you. Breathless and savage,

Toward Andromeda you flee. [ix]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

[The Lightning of Your Kiss]

 

For Andromeda, she has a beautiful

recompense.

—Sappho

 

For Andromeda: the lightning of your kiss, your unrests,

Your veils of a virgin, Atthis, to her you run

With your languors of a lover, the slow sigh of your unappeased breasts,

Oh faithless one!

 

For Andromeda: the gold-brown evenings, the songs,

The shadow of your lashes on your pupils through the magic hours,

The nights of Lesbos where exalts a fragrance that belongs

to eternal flowers.

 

For me: favored, fitful sleep under the skies

Where die the Pleiades; and the grave cadences,

The winter of your voice, the cold rhyme of your eyes,

Your pale silences. [x]

 

 •    •    •  

 

 

[All is White]

 

The stars around the beautiful moon

veil their clear faces when, in her

full, she illumines the earth with

gleams of silver.

—Sappho

 

All is white where the moon pours her shower.

At her feet groans the tormented sea.

Serene, she sees solitude flower

In the night, and chastity.

 

Before divine Selene the stars

Have veiled their shining faces, and the white,

Snowing from the candid sky, scars

The earth with silver light. [xi]

 

 •    •    •

 

 

[Sandals of Gold]

 

The dawn came to me in golden

sandals.

—Sappho

 

My eyes have seen dawn fleeing in sandals of gold:

On the taciturn mountain-top her swift feet gleam,

On treetops of the forest whose sleeping depths yet enfold

The nocturnal dream. [xii]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

[Between the Breasts of Conquered Love]

 

Sleep on the breast of your

gentle mistress.

—Sappho

 

Sleep between the breasts of the conquered love. Rest,

Oh virgin in whose glance a brash adolescent gleams,

And let nuptial Hesperus lead you in your passionate quest

Toward happy dreams. [xiii]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

 

[Daughter of Kuprôs]

 

Come, Goddess of Cyprus, and

pour delicately into the golden

cups the nectar mixed with joys.

—Sappho

 

Daughter of Kuprôs, whose lightning glance destroys,

Delicately with your graceful hands tip up

And pour the nectar mixed of bitterness and joys

Into each golden cup. [xiv]

 

•    •    • 

 

 

[Countless Hearts]

 

. . . as to my sob: and that

the stormy winds carry it away

for sufferings.

—Sappho

 

Let the evening wind carry away my sob

Towards the prostrate cities and plains of vague tomorrows;

Carry it away to mingle with the aching throb

Of distant sorrows.

 

Carry it, more grave, more gentle than feeble speech,

A pitiable appeal through the ages that unroll,

To the countless hearts my fraternal love may reach,

Appease and console. [xv]

 

•    •    •  

 

 

Virgin

 

. . . as a sweet apple reddens at

the extremity of the branch,

at the distant extremity:

the fruit-pickers have forgotten

it or, rather, they have not

forgotten it, but they have

not been able to reach it.

—Sappho

 

As an apple, blushed and golden-skinned,

Balances itself among the verdure and sways

At the extremity of a branch where whispers and plays

A singing, trembling wind,

 

As an apple against the evening sky

Laughs at the changing will of the breeze in the tree,

You shine forth, mocking the vain cupidity

Of the covetous passerby.

 

The knowing ardor of autumn enfolds

In your nudity all ambers and golds.

You keep the fruit of your body beautiful

And inaccessible. [xvi]

 

•    •    • 

 

 

Inscription at the Base of a Statue

 

Virgins, although mute, I reply . . .

—Sappho

 

To those who ask, oh virgins, I intone

With tireless modulation in a voice of stone:

“Under the profound stars, my eternity

Saddens me and crushes me.

 

“Serene, I see that which changes, which takes flight.

I was consecrated to Aithopia formerly,

To the ardent virgin, sister of amorous night,

By her fond votary,

 

“Arista. I hear the fervency of their sighs

On summer nights whose breath grazes me like a flower

With regrets. Memorial, I immortalize

The kisses of an hour.” [xvii]

 

•    •    • 

 

 

[I Do Not Hope]

 

I do not hope to touch the sky

with my two arms extended.

—Sappho

 

With two arms outstretched I do not expect

To touch the sky where mists collect;

I do not hope, as purple night nears,

To clutch the stars. [xviii]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Trembling Rhythms]

 

So, on the mountains, the shepherds

trample the hyacinths underfoot,

and the flower purples the earth.

—Sappho

 

. . . And wounded as a slender hyacinth,

Unhappy Atthis, you remember yet.

Your sad hair weeps, in the muffled shadow,

Ashes of gold.

 

Shepherds, singing on the lonely mountain,

Fling to the evening their trembling rhythms,

And the purple flower bloodies the earth

At the feet of passers-by. [xix]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Fragile Threads]

 

Someone, I believe, will

remember us in the future.

—Sappho

 

On tomorrows that fate weaves from the fragile threads spun here

Future beings will remember what we have done;

At this, mistress I adore, let us not fear

The shadow of oblivion.

 

For those born after us to this world where sound

The lamentations of song will cast their sighs

Toward me who loved you fiercely with an anguish profound,

Toward you, delight of my eyes.

 

The fluctuating days, the perfumed nights to ensue

Will come to make eternal across the abyss

Of time the joy, the ardent suffering we knew,

Our tremblings, our embrace, our kiss. [xx]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Sleep Drips]

 

All around, (the breeze) murmurs

freshly through the branches of

the apple trees, and from the

trembling leaves runs sleep.

—Sappho

 

Coolness glides through the apple trees.

In the depth of the verdure the brook sings

The confused drone that fills a hive of bees

With gentle murmurings.

 

Under the sun the summer grasses fade.

The rose, expiring after the harsh ravage

Of the heat, languishes toward the shade.

Sleep drips from the foliage. [xxi]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[The Green and Quiet Night]

 

. . . and sleep with the black eyes,

(child) of the night.

—Sappho

 

The grave sunset puts out the golden light . . .

Appeasing all sorrows, extinguishing all joys,

Sleep, with black eyes, child of the green and quiet night,

Dims the noise.

 

And the soul of the lilies wander in its breath, unseen,

Not knowing how to content the sighs that suspire

From the ardent sea at the foot of Mitylene

Tired of desire. [xxii]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[In Your Sweetness I Rejoice]

 

. . . virgin with a sweet voice.

—Sappho

 

I listen, dreaming. Your refreshing voice

Runs like the water of a spring over moss,

Appeasing my old sorrows, my persistent loss.

In your virgin sweetness I rejoice. [xxiii]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Bent Soul]

 

Eros today has torn my soul,

wind which in the mountain

fells the oaks.

—Sappho

 

Eros has bent my soul with giant strokes

As a mountain wind twists and breaks great oaks . . .

And I see perish in the fire’s moving light

A whole moth flight. [xxiv]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Fennel and Thyme]

 

. . . a very delicate virgin

picking flowers.

—Sappho

 

I saw you plucking the fennel and the thyme

And the flower of the wind – the frail anemone –

Oh virgin. And your childlike smile I could see

Where the dawn trembled for a time.

 

With the vigor of a young shrub my body came to you,

Grazed lingeringly your tender and broken flesh.

You lifted to me your eye more fresh

Than running water or the dew.

 

Fatal Eros and amorous Destiny

And Aphrodite whose chosen priestess I am,

We came to cut the fennel and the thyme,

Atthis, mistress dear to me. [xxv]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Beneath]

 

I shall be always virgin [from man].

—Sappho

 

I shall remain virgin as the serene snow

Which, in a white dream, lies there below,

Sleeping palely, that winter protects

From the brutal sun.

 

As breath of the north and river of rain,

I shall flee imprint and soiling stain.

The grasp that strangles, the kiss that infects

And wounds I shall shun.

 

I shall remain virgin as the distant moon

That the sobbing desires of the sea importune,

That the reaching mirror of the sea reflects,

Never to be won. [xxvi]

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Purple as Hyacinth]

 

The light . . . which does not at all

destroy the view . . . similar to a hyacinth.

—Sappho

 

Night, purple as a hyacinth bloom,

Your light flowers in the orchard of the skies.

Your perfume is chaste and your gentle gloom

Consoles the eyes. [xxvii]

 

 

•    •    •

 

 

[Divine Fire]

 

. . . predominant, as when the bard of

Lesbos dominates strangers.

—Sappho

 

Ruling the earth where resounds your lyre,

Stand up, splendid, Greek bard of Lesbos

Who alone have known the divine fire

And laughter of Paphos.

 

Sappho, scatter through fathoms of space,

Disdaining the charm of the alien throngs,

The quivering of your songs which surpass

All foreign songs. [xxviii]

 

 •    •    •

 

 

[Of Salt and Flowers]

 

. . . Sappho . . . calls Love sweet

and bitter, and one who gives

Sorrow . . . she names him

the weaver of chimeras.

—Sappho

 

Eros, with hands prodigal of miseries,

You spread woe, and your bitter lips have the savor

Of salt and the flowers’ fragrant flavor,

Weaver of fantasies. [xxix]

 

•    •    •

 

 

The Disdain of Sappho

 

You are nothing to me.

As for me, I have no

resentment whatever,

but I have a soul serene.

—Sappho

 

You who judge me, you are nothing at all in my sight.

I have too long looked on the shadows of infinity.

I have no pride whatever in your honors, no fright

At your calumny.

 

You will never know how to tarnish the devotion

Of my passion for the beauty of women, that my verse acclaims,

Changing as the sunsets of summer, changing as the motion

Of waves and flames.

 

The dazzling foreheads that graze my life and vivify

My broken songs nothing can ever demean.

I am like a statue in the midst of passersby,

My soul is serene. [xxx]

 

 

 

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Let us Go to Mytilene

 

Softness of my songs, let us go to Mytilene

See how my soul soars once more,

Nocturnal and timid as a moth

With golden pupils.

 

Let us go to the welcome of the adored virgins:

Our eyes will know the tears of returning:

We will finally see fading the places

Of lusterless loves.

 

The shadow of Sappho, weaving violets

And on her face a feverish pallor,

Will smile with her silent lips

Weary with sorrow.

 

There Gorgô will weep, the forsaken one,

There the eyes of Atthis will flower,

Who keeps in her flesh, wisely caressed,

The ardor from before.

 

They will sing to the solemn Graces,

The golden sandals of cool mirrored Dawn,

Freshly opened roses and the eternal oceans,

The evening star.

 

We will see Timas, the much grieved virgin,

Who never yielded to the torments of Eros,

And we will re-sing to an intoxicated earth

The hymn of Lesbos. [xxxi]

 

 

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