Array Anacreon - The Greatest Classics of Ancient Greece

Thy slender limbs have all a Satyr's grace,

Hylas, the Wood-God, dimples in thy face;

These maids of mine, beloved and loving me,

My dreams have made thy Nymphs to sport with thee.

I heard fair Mitylene's plaudits cease

O'er Lykas, Menon and Dinnomenes;

And hail thy beauty worthy of the prize,

Cupbearer to the council of the wise.

No noble youth the prytaneum holds,

Whose graceful form the purple tunic folds

Can match with thee, when on affairs of state

All Lesbos gathers with the wise and great.

SPRING

Come, shell divine, be vocal now for me,

As when the Hebrus river and the sea

To Lesbos bore, on waves harmonious,

The head and golden lyre of Orpheus.

Calliope, queen of the tuneful throng,

Descend and be the Muse of melic song;

For through my frame life's tides renewing bring

The glad vein-warming vigor of the spring.

The skies that dome the earth with far blue fire

Make the wide land one temple of desire;—

Just now across my cheek I felt a God,

In the enraptured breeze, pass zephyr-shod.

Was that Pan's flute, O Atthis, that we heard,

Or the soft love-note of a woodland bird?

That flame a scarlet wing that skimmed the stream,

Or the red flash of our impassioned dream?

Ah, soon again we two shall gather fair

Garlands of dill and rose to deck our bare

White arms that cling, white breast that burns to breast,

When the long night of love shall banish rest.

Table of Contents

PRELUDE

Deftly on my little

Seven-stringed barbitos,

Now to please my girl friends

Songs I set to music.

Maidens fair, companions

Of the Muses, never

Toward you shall my feelings

Undergo a change.

Chanted in a plaintive

Old Ionic measure,

All the songs I give you

Are the songs of love.

ANDROMEDA

What bucolic maiden

Now thy heart bewitches,

O my Andromeda

Of the strange amours?

Round her awkward ankles

She has not the faintest

Sense of art to draw her

Long ungraceful tunic.

Yet she surely makes thee,

O my Andromeda,

For thy sweet unlawful

Love a fair requital.

Joy and praise attend thee,

In thy keen perceptive

Taste for beauty, daughter

Of Polyanax!

Of Polyanax!

EUNEICA

Aphrodite's handmaid,

Bright as gold thou earnest,

Tender woven garlands

Round thy tender neck;

Sweet as soft Persuasion,

Lissome as the Graces,

Shy Euneica, lovely

Girl from Salamis.

Slender thou as Syrinx,

As the waving reed-nymph,

Once by Pan, the god of

Summer winds, deflowered.

On thy lips whose quiver

Seems to plead for pity,

Mine shall rest and linger

Like the mouth of Pan

On the mouth of Syrinx,

When his breath that filled her

Blew through all her body

Music of his love.

GORGO

Gorgo, I am weary

Of thy love's insistence,

Thou to me appearest

An ill-favored child.

Though I am than Gello

Fonder still of virgins,

Toward thee I have never

Felt the least desire.

Yesternight I knew not

What to do, for pity

Moved my bosom deeply,

Seeing thee implore.

Harassed by alternate

Yielding and refusal,

I was half persuaded

Then to grant thy prayer.

At my door thy presence

Lingers like a shadow;

Vain wouldst thou reproach me

With appealing eyes.

Dost thou think by constant

Proofs of lasting passion,

Slowly my obdurate

Will to wear away?

Gorgo, I am weary

Of thy love's insistence,

And my strength exhausted

Grants thy wish at last.

MNASIDICA

Set, O Dica, garlands on thy lovely

Glinting mass of fine and golden tresses,

Sprays of dill with fingers soft entwining

While I stand apart to better judge.

Those who have fair wreaths about the forehead,

Breathing brentheian odor to the senses,

Ever first find favor with the Graces

Who from wreathless suppliants turn away.

Dica, Mnasidica, thou art shapely

With the flowing curves of Aphrodite;

Eyes the color of her azure ocean

Washing wide on Cyprus' languid shore.

In thy every movement grace unconscious

Sways the rhythmic poem of thy body,

Charming with elusive undulation

Like a splendid lily in the wind.

As I stand apart to judge the better

Fair effects that roses add to beauty,

All thy rays of loveliness concentered

Sun me till I swoon with swift desire.

TELESIPPA

Sleep thou in the bosom

Of thy tender girl friend,

Telesippa, gentle

Maiden from Miletus.

Like twin petals shyly

Closing to the darkness,

Dewy on your drooping

Lids shall fall her kisses.

While her arms enfold you,

On your drowsy senses

Shall her soft caresses

Seal delicious languor.

Warm from her desireful

Heart the flush of passion

On your cheek unconscious,

With her sighs shall deepen.

All the long sweet night-time,

Sleepless while you slumber,

She shall lie and quiver

With her love's mad longing.

GYRINNO

Now the silver crescent

Of the moon has vanished,

With the golden Pleiads

Drifting down the west.

It is after midnight

And the time is passing,

Hours we pledged to passion

And I sleep alone.

Anger ill becomes thee,

Tender-souled Gyrinno,

Shapelier is Dica

But less loved by me.

Art thou still relentless,

Wilful one, annulling

All thy protestations

In the fervid past?

Can it, O Charites,

Be thou hast forgotten?

Dost thou love another,

Even now, perchance?

Ah, my tears are falling,

Yet in my despairing

Mood I lie and listen

For thy furtive step;

For the lightest rustle

Of thy flowing garment,

For thy sweet and panting

Whisper at the door.

Now the moon has vanished

With the golden Pleiads;

It is after midnight

And I sleep alone.

MEGARA

Thou burnest us, Megara,

With thy passions wild;

Bringing from Panormus

Such unbridled fires.

Thou burnest us, a supple

Flow of tortured flame,

Raging, biting, searing,

Lawless of the will.

Thou burnest us, Megara,

Love must know reserve,

Curbing power to keep it

Keener for restraint.

ERINNA

Haughtier than thou, O fair Erinna,

I have never met with any maiden.

Such a careless scorn as thine for passion

Proves a dire affront to Aphrodite.

When with soft desire she wounds thy bosom,

Thou shalt know love's pain and doubly suffer.

Keep the gifts I gave thee, long rejected;

Fabrics for thy lap from far Phocea,

Babylonian unguents, scented sandals,

And the costly mitra for thy tresses;

Tripods worked in brass to flank the altar

With the ivory figure of the Goddess;

Where the sacrificial fumes from sacred

Flames shall rise to gladden and appease her,

In the hour when at her call thy fervid

Breast and mouth to mine shall be relinquished.

GONGYLA

It was when the sunset

Burned with saffron fire,

And Apollo's coursers

Turned below the hills,

That on Mitylene's

Marble bridge we met,

Gongyla, thou golden

Maid of Colophon.

Like the breath of morning

Or a breeze from sea,

Fresh thy beauty smote me,

Virile of the north.

Startled by thy vision,

Transports half divine

Flooded veins and bosom,