Stung with my love, and furious with despair,
All torn my garments, and my bosom bare,
My woes, thy crimes, I to the world proclaim;
Such inconfiftent things are love and shame!
'Tis thou art all my care and my delight,
My daily longing, and my dream by night :
Oh night, more pleafing than the brightest day, 145
When fancy gives what absence takes away,
And, drefs'd in all its vifionary charms,
Reflores my fair deferter to my arms!
Then round your neck in wanton wreaths I twine,
Then you, methinks, as fondly circle mine:
A thousand tender words I hear and speak;
A thousand melting kiffes give, and take:
Then fiercer joys, I blush to mention these,
Yet, while I blush, confefs how much they please.
But when, with day, the fweet delufions fly,
And all things wake to life and joy, but I,
Non veniunt in idem pudor atque amor: omne videbat
Vulgus; eram lacero pectus aperta finu.
Tu mihi cura, Phaon; te fomnia noftra reducunt;
Somnia formofa candidiora die.
Illic te invenio, quanquam regionibus abfis;
Sed non longa fatis gaudia fomnus habet.
Saepe tuos noftra cervice onerare lacertos,
Saepe tune videor fuppofuiffe meos.
Blandior interdum; verifque fimillima verba
Eloquor; et vigilant fenfibus ora meis.
Ofcula cognofco; quae tu committere linguae,
Aptaque confuêras accipere, apta dare.
Ulteriora pudet narrare; fed omnia fiunt,
Et juvat, et fine te non libet effe mihi.
At cum fe Titan oftendit, et omnia fecum;
Tam cito me fomnos deftituiffe queror.
As if once more forfaken, I complain,
And close my eyes to dream of you again :
Then frantic rife, and like fome Fury rove
Thro' lonely plains, and thro' the filent grove,
As if the filent grove, and lonely plains,
That knew my pleasures, could relieve my pains.
I view the Grotto, once the scene of love,
The rocks around, the hanging roofs above,
That charm'd me more, with native mofs o'ergrown, Than Phrygian marble, or the Parian stone.
I find the fhades that veil'd our joys before;
But, Phaon gone, those shades delight no more.
Here the prefs'd herbs with bending tops betray
Where oft entwin'd in am'rous folds we lay;
I kifs that earth which once was prefs'd by you,
And all with tears the with'ring herbs bedew.
For thee the fading trees appear to mourn,
And birds defer their fongs till thy return:
Antra nemufque peto, tanquam nemus antraque pro
Confcia deliciis illa fuere tuis.
Illuc mentis inops, ut quam furialis Erichtho
Impulit, in collo crine jacente feror.
Antra vident oculi fcabro pendentia topho,
Quae mihi Mygdonii marmoris inftar erant.
Invenio fylvam, quae faepe cubilia nobis
Praebuit, et multa texit opaca coma.
At non invenio dominum fylvaeque, meumque.
Vile folum locus eft: dos erat ille loci.
Agnovi preffas noti mihi cefpitis herbas :
De noftro curvum pondere gramen erat.
Incubui, tetigique locum qua parte fuisti;
Grata prius lacrymas combibit herba meas,
Night fhades the groves, and all in filence lie,
All but the mournful Philomel and I:
With mournful Philomel I join my strain,
Of Tereus fhe, of Phaon I complain.
A spring there is, whofe filver waters show,
Clear as a glass, the fhining fands below;
A flow'ry Lotos fpreads its arms above,
Shades all the banks, and seems itself a grove;
Eternal greens the moffy margin grace,
Watch'd by the fylvan genius of the place.
Here as I lay, and fwell'd with tears the flood,
Before my fight a watʼry Virgin ftood:
She ftood and cry'd, "O you that love in vain ! "Fly hence, and feek the fair Leucadian main. "There ftands a rock, from whose impending steep Apollo's fane furveys the rolling deep;
"There injur'd lovers leaping from above,
"Their flames extinguish, and forget to love.
Quinetiam rami pofitis lugere videntur
Frondibus; et nullae dulce queruntur aves.
Sola virum non ulta pie moeftiffima mater
Concinit Imarium Daulias ales Ityn.
Ales Ityn, Sappho defertos cantat amores:
Hactenus, ut media caetera nocte filent,
Eft nitidus, vitroque magis perlucidus omni,
Fons facer; hunc multi numen habere putant.
Quem fupra ramos expandit aquatica lotos,
Una nemus; tenero cespite terra viret.
Hic ego cum laffos pofuiffem fletibus artus,
Conftitit ante oculos Naïas una meos.
Conftitit, et dixit, "Quoniam non ignibus aequis "Ureris, Ambracias terra petenda tibi.
"Phoebus ab excelfo, quantum patet, afpicit æquor
"Actiacum populi Leucadiumque vocant.
"Deucalion once with hopeless fury burn'd, "In vain he lov'd, relentless Pyrrha fcorn'd: "But when from hence he plung'd into the main, 195 "Deucalion fcorn'd, and Pyrrha lov'd in vain. "Hafte, Sappho, hafte, from high Leucadia throw. "Thy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below!' She spoke, and vanish'd with the voice - I rife, And filent tears fall trickling from my eyes. I go, ye Nymphs! those rocks and feas to prove; How much I fear, but ah, how much I love! I go, ye Nymphs, where furious love infpires; Let female fears fubmit to female fires. To rocks and feas I fly from Phaon's hate, And hope from feas and rocks a milder fate. Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow, And foftly lay me on the waves below!
And thou, kind Love, my finking limbs sustain, Spread thy foft wings, and waft me o'er the main, Nor let a lover's death the guiltlefs flood prophane!
"Hinc fe Deucalion Pyrrhae fuccenfus amore
Mifit, et illaefo corpore preffit aquas. "Nec mora: verfus Amor tetigit lentiffima Pyrrhae "Pectora; Deucalion igne levatus erat.
"Hanc legem locus ille tenet, pete protinus altam
"Leucada; nec faxo defiluiffe time."
Ut monuit, cum voce abiit. Ego frigida furgo: 200
Nec gravidae lacrymas continuere genae.
Ibimus, O Nymphae, monftrataque faxa petemus.
Sit procul infano victus amore timor.
Quicquid erit, melius quam nunc erit: aura, fubito
Et mea non magnum corpora pondus habent.
Tu quoque mollis Amor, pennas fuppone cadenti:
Ne fim Leucadiae mortua crimen aquae,
On Phoebus' fhrine my harp I'll then beftow,
And this Infcription fhall be plac'd below.
"Here he who fung, to him that did inspire,
Sappho to Phoebus confecrates her Lyre; "What fuits with Sappho, Phoebus, fuits with thee; "The gift, the giver, and the God agree."
But why, alas, relentless youth, ah why To diftant feas muft tender Sappho fly?
Thy charms than thofe may far more pow'rful be, 220
And Phoebus felf is lefs a God to me.
Ah! can't thou doom me to the rocks and fea,
O far more faithlefs and more hard than they?
Ah! can't thou rather fee this tender breast
Dash'd on these rocks than to thy bofom prefs'd? 225
This breaft which once, in vain! you lik'd fo well;
Where the Loves play'd, and where the Mufes dwell.
Inde chelyn Phoebo communia munera ponam :
Et fub ea verfus unus et alter erunt.
"Grata lyram pofui tibi, Phoebe, poëtria Sappho:
"Convenit illa mihi, convenit illa tibi."
Cur tamen Actiacas miferam me mittis ad oras,
Cum profugum poffis ipfe referre pedem ?
Tu mihi Leucadia potes effe falubrior unda :
Et forma et meritis tu mihi Phoebus eris.
An potes, ô fcopulis undaque ferocior illa,
Si moriar, titulum mortis habere meae ?
At quanto melius jungi mea peñora tecum,
Quam poterant faxis praecipitanda dari!
Haec funt illa, Phaon, quae tu laudare folebas;
Vifaque funt toties ingeniofa tibi.
Nunc vellem facunda forent: dolor artibus obftat; › Ingeniumque meis fubftitit omne malis..
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