Array Anacreon - Yale Required Reading - Collected Works (Vol. 1)

Shook me with desire.

Soon the kinder sunglow

Of Æolic lands

Melted all the futile

Snows about thy heart.

DAMOPHYLA

Cold of heart and strangely

Uninclined to passion,

Wisdom's vigil leaves thee,

Proud Damophyla.

Sapphics thou hast written,

Verses in my metre,

With a skill surpassing

In the melic art.

Love's superb enchantment

Thou art fain to banish,

Like the virgin Huntress

Long by thee adored.

Molded by thy tunic,

Every arching contour

Of her chaste and noble

Form I dream to see;

Even view her stepping

From the leafy covert

Down the dawn-white valley,

Stately as a stag.

Long I sued but found thee

Deaf to all entreaty,

Till one summer twilight

Listless in the heat;

Soothed by slumber's languor,

And my low monodic

Voice that hymned a paean

In the praise of love;

Loth to yield yet vanquished,

As I knelt beside thee,

All thy long resistance

To my kiss succumbed.

ANAGORA

Anagora, fairest

Spoil of fateful battle,

Babylonian temples

Knew thy luring song.

Wrested from barbaric

Captors for thy beauty,

Thou wert made a priestess

At Mylitta's shrine.

Once these flexile fingers

Clasped in mine so closely,

Neath the temple's arches

Thrummed the tabor soft.

Thou hast taught me secrets

Of the cryptic chambers,

How the zonahs worship

In the burning East;

Raptures that my wildest

Dreaming never pictured,

Arts of love that charmed me,

Subtle, new and strange.

Hearken to my earnest

Prayer, O Aphrodite!

May the night be doubled

Now for our delight.

Table of Contents

PHILOMEL

Philomel in my garden,

Messenger sweet of springtide,

From the bough of the olive tree utter

Tidings ecstatic.

Linger long on thy olden

Note as in days remembered;

Ere the Boatman that knew Aphrodite

Ravished my vision.

Fatal glamor of beauty,

Beauty of Gods made mortal;

Ah, before its delight I am ever

Fearful of heaven.

Spring in breeze and the blossom,

Grasses and leaves and odors,

On my heart with the breath of a vanished

April is shaken;

Shaken with thrill and regret of

Lost caresses and kisses;

Anactoria's memory, Atthis

Never forgotten.

Philomel in my garden,

Messenger sweet of springtide,

From the bough of the olive tree utter

Tidings ecstatic.

GOLDEN PULSE

Golden pulse grew on the shore,

Ferns along the hill,

And the red cliff roses bore

Bees to drink their fill;

Bees that from the meadows bring

Wine of melilot,

Honey-sups on golden wing

To the garden grot.

But to me, neglected flower,

Phaon will not see,

Passion brings no crowning hour,

Honey nor the bee.

THE SWALLOW

Daughter of Pandion, lovely

Swallow that veers at my window,

Swift on the flood of the sunshine

Darting thy shadow;

What is thy innocent purpose,

Why dost thou hover and haunt me?

Is it a kinship of sorrow

Brings thee anear me?

Must thou forever be tongueless,

Flying in fear of Tereus?

Must he for Itys pursue thee,

Changed to a lapwing?

Tireless of pinion and never

Resting on bush or the branches,

Close to the earth, up the azure,

Over the treetops;

After thy wing in its madness

Follows my glance, as a flitting

Child on the track of its mother

Hastens in silence.

Daughter of Pandion, lovely

Swallow that veers at my window,

Hast thou a message from Cyprus

Telling of Phaon?

TIDINGS

She wrapped herself in linen woven close,

Stuffs delicate and texture-fine as those

The dark Nile traders for our bartering

From Egypt, Crete and far Phocea bring.

Love lent her feet the wings of winds to reach

(Whose steps stir not the shingle of the beach)

My marble court and, breathless, bid me know

My lover's sails across the harbor blow.

He seemed to her, as to himself he seems,

Like some bright God long treasured in her dreams;

She saw him standing at his galley's prow—

My Phaon, mine, in Mitylene now!

HESPERUS

Hesperus shines

Low on the eastern wave,

Off toward the Asian shore;

Over faint lines

Whose grays and purples pave

Where seas night-calmed adore.

Fair vesper fire,

Fairest of stars, the light

Benign of secret bliss;

Star of desire,

Bringing to me with night

Dreams and my Phaon's kiss.

DAWN

Just now the golden-sandalled Dawn

Peered through the lattice of my room;

Why must thou fare so soon, my Phaon?

Last night I met thee at the shore,

A thousand hues were in the sky;

The breeze from Cyprus blew, my Phaon!

I drew, to lave thy heated brow,

My kerchief dripping from the sea;

Why hadst thou sailed so far, my Phaon?

Far up the narrow mountain paths

We heard the shepherds fluting home;

Like some white God thou seemed, my Phaon!

And through the olive trees we saw

The twinkle of my vesper lamp;

Wilt kiss me now as then, my Phaon?

Nay, loosen not with gentle force

The clasp of my restraining arms;

I will not let thee go, my Phaon!

See, deftly in my trailing robe

I spring and draw the lattice close;

Is it not night again, my Phaon?

THE FAREWELL

Beloved, stand face to face,

And, lifting lids, disclose to me the grace,

The Paphic fire that lingers yet and lies

Reflected in thy eyes.

Phaon, my sole beloved,

Stand not to my mad passion all unmoved;

O let, ere thou to far Panormus sail,

One hour of love prevail.

Dear ingrate, come and let

Thy breath like odor from a cassolet,

Thy smile, the clinging touch of lips and heart

Anoint me, ere we part.

Phaon, I yearn and seek

But thee alone; and what I feel must speak

In all these fond and wilful ways of mine,

O mortal, made divine!

My girl friends now no more

Hang their sweet gifts of garlands at my door;

Dear maids, with all your vanished empery

Ye now are naught to me.

Phaon, thy galley rides

Within the harbor's mouth and waits the tides

And favoring winds, far to the west to fly

And leave me here to die.

The brawny rowers lean

To bend long-stroking oars; and changing scene

And fairer loves than mine shall soon efface

This last divine embrace.

Phaon, the lifting breeze!

See, at thy feet I kneel and clasp thy knees!

Go not, go not! O hear my sobbing prayer,

And yield to my despair!

DARK-EYED SLEEP

Dark-eyed Sleep, child of Night,

Come in thy shadow garment to my couch,

And with thy soothing touch,

Cool as the vesper breeze,

Grant that I may forget;

Bestow condign release,

A taste of rest that comes with endless sleep;

Lure off the haunting dreams,

The dire Eumenides

That torture my repose.

For I would live a space

Though Phaon has forsaken me, nor yet

Be found on shadow fields

Among the lilies tall

Of pale Persephone.

THE CLIFF OF LEUCAS

Afar-seen cliff

Stands in the western sea

Toward Cephallenian lands.

Apollo's temple crowns

Its whitened crest,

And at its base

The waves eternal beat.

Its leap has power

To cure the pangs

Of unrequited love.

Thither pale lovers go

With anguished hearts