If all the lovers of ancient poetry were asked to name one of the most precious of priceless things, a symbol of delicious and beautiful human genius, the answer that would surely rush to every tongue would be "The Lost Poems of Sappho." These jewels of radiance continue to dazzle the eye to this day, even though all that remains are a handfull of broken gleams and star dust fragments.
III
Power and beauty and knowledge,--
Pan, Aphrodite, or Hermes,--
Whom shall we life-loving mortals
Serve and be happy?
Lo 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
...
And thou, sea-born Aphrodite,
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.
XI
When the Cretan maidens
Dancing up the full moon
Round some fair new altar,
Trample the soft blossoms of fine grass,
There is mirth among them.
Aphrodite's children
Ask her benediction
On their bridals in the summer night.
-Sappho-
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