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SAPPHO

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PHAON.

SAY, lovely youth, that do'ft my heart command,

Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?
Muft then her name the wretched writer prove,
To thy remembrance loft, as to thy love?
Ask not the cause that I new numbers chuse,
The lute neglected, and the lyric Muse?
Love taught my tears in fadder notes to flow,
And tun'd my heart to elegies of woe.

I burn, I burn, as when thro' ripen'd corn
By driving winds the spreading flames are born!
Phaon to Etna's fcorching fields retires,

While I confume with more than Ætna's fires!
No more my foul a charm in music finds,
Music has charms alone for peaceful minds.
Soft fcenes of folitude no more can please,
Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.
No more the Lesbian dames my paffion move,
Once the dear objects of my guilty love;

All other loves are loft in only thine,
Ah youth ungrateful to a flame like mine!
Whom would not all those blooming charms furprise,

Thofe heav'nly looks, and dear deluding eyes?
The harp and bow would you like Phœbus bear,
A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear;

Would you with ivy wreath your flowing hair,
Not Bacchus' felf with Phaon could compare:
Yet Phoebus lov'd, and Bacchus felt the flame;
One Daphne warm'd, and one the Cretan dame:
Nymphs that in verfe no more could rival me,
Than ev'n thofe Gods contend in charms with thee.
The Muses teach me all their fofteft lays,
And the wide world refounds with Sappho's praise.
Tho' great Alcæus more fublimely fings,
And strikes with bolder rage the founding ftrings,
No lefs renown attends the moving lyre,
Which Venus tunes, and all her loves infpire;
To me what nature has in charms deny'd,
Is well by wit's more lafting flames supply'd.
Tho' short my ftature, yet my name extends
To heav'n itself, and earth's remotest ends.
Brown as I am, an Ethiopian dame
Infpir d young Perfeus with a gen❜rous flame;
Turtles and doves of diff'ring hues unite,
And gloffy jet is pair'd with shining white.
If to no charms thou wilt thy heart refign,
But fuch as merit, fuch as equal thine,
By none, alas! by none thou canst be mov'd,
Phaon alone by Phaon must be lov'd!
Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ,
Once in her arms you center'd all your joy:
No time the dear remembrance can remove,
For oh! how vaft a memory has love?

My mufic, then, you could for ever hear,
And all my words were music to your ear.
You ftopp'd with kiffes my enchanting tongue,
And found my kisses sweeter than my song.
In all I pleas'd, but most in what was beft;
And the last joy was dearer than the rest.

Then with each word, each glance, each motion fir'd,
You ftill enjoy'd, and yet you still defir'd, ¡

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'Till all diffolving in the trance we lay,
And in tumultuous raptures dy'd away.
The fair Sicilians now thy foul inflame
Why was I born, ye Gods, a Lesbian dame?
But ah beware, Sicilian nymphs! nor boast
That wand'ring heart which I fo lately loft;
Nor be with all those tempting words abus'd,
Thofe tempting words were all to Sappho us'd.
And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains,
Have pity, Venus, on your poet's pains!
Shall fortune ftill in one fad tenor run,
And still increase the woes fo foon begun!
Inur'd to forrow from my tender years,
My parent's ashes drank my early tears:
My brother next, neglecting wealth and fame,
Ignobly burn'd in a destructive flame:

An infant daughter late my griefs increas'd,
And all a mother's cares diftract my breast.
Alas, what more could fate itself impose,
But thee, the laft and greatest of my woes!
No more my robes in waving purple flow,
Nor on my hand the sparkling di'monds glow;
No more my locks in ringlets curl'd diffuse

The coftly sweetness of Arabian dews,

Nor braids of gold the varied treffes bind,
That fly diforder'd with the wanton wind:
For whom should Sappho use such arts as these?
He's gone, whom only she defir'd to please!
Cupid's light darts my tender bofom move,
Still is there caufe for Sappho ftill to love:
So from my birth the Sisters fix'd my doom,
And gave to Venus all my life to come:
Or, while my Mufe in melting notes complains,
My yielding heart keeps measure to my ftrains.
By charms like thine which all my soul have won,
Who might not —— ah! who would not be undone?
For thofe Aurora Cephalus might scorn,

And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn.
For thofe might Cynthia lengthen Fhaon's fleep,
And bid Endymion nightly tend his sheep.
Venus for thofe had rapt thee to the skies,
But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes.
O fcarce a youth, yet fcarce a tender boy!
O ufeful time for lovers to employ!
Pride of thy age, and glory of thy race,
Come to these arms, and melt in this embrace!
The vows you never will return, receive;
And take at least the love you will not give.
See, while I write, my words are loft in tears;
The lefs my fenfe, the more my love appears.
Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu,
(At least to feign was never hard to you)
Farewell, my Lesbian love, you might have said,
Or coldly thus, Farewell, oh Lesbian maid!

No tear did you, no parting kiss receive,
Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve.
No lover's gift your Sappho could confer,
And wrongs and woes were all you left with her.
No charge I gave you, and no charge could give,
But this, Be mindful of our loves, and live.
Now by the Nine, thofe pow'rs ador'd by me,
And Love, the God that ever waits on thee,
When I first heard (from whom I hardly knew)
That you were filed, and all my joys with you,
Like fome fad ftatue, speechlefs, pale I stood,
Grief chill'd my breast, and stopp'd my freezing blood;
No figh to rife, no tear had pow'r to flow,
Fix'd in a ftupid lethargy of woe:

But when its way th'impetuous paffion found,
I rend my treffes, and my breast I wound;
I rave, then weep; I curfe, and then complain;
Now fwell to rage, now melt in tears again.
Not fiercer pangs diftract the mournful dame,
Whofe firft-born infant feeds the fun'ral flame,
My scornful brother with a smile
appears,

Infults my woes, and triumphs in my tears,
His hated image ever haunts my eyes;
And why this grief? thy daughter lives, he cries.
Stung with my love, and furious with despair,
All torn my garments, and my bofom 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,

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