If you're not dead, surely you can feel. If you can't understand, might as well be dead.



Sappho (ca. 7th–6th century B.C.)
(translated)


To Atthis

My Atthis, although our dear Anaktoria
lives in distant Sardis,
she thinks of us constantly, and

of the life we shared in days when for her
you were a splendid goddess,
and your singing gave her deep joy.

Now she shines among Lydian women as
when the red-fingered moon
rises after sunset, erasing

stars around her, and pouring light equally
across the salt sea
and over densely flowered fields;

and lucent dew spreads on the earth to quicken
roses and fragile thyme
and the sweet-blooming honey-lotus.

Now while our darling wanders she thinks of
lovely Atthis's love,
and longing sinks deep in her breast.

She cries loudly for us to come!  We hear,
for the night's many tongues
carry her cry across the sea.

In ancient days Pinytus (1st cent. A.D.) composed this epigram:


This tomb reveals where Sappho’s ashes lie,
But her sweet words of wisdom ne’er will die.

Goodness, how can one ever love without knowing Sappho? How can one ever love without loving Sappho of Lesbos?