smell the cabin’s wick and the nets? Oh, drown me,
Egyptian lion, Etruscan charioteer, lunge and shield:
yours is the tyranny.
Surely feminine love is kinder, less responsible,
graced with evasions. Masculine love is a beginning, an
intensity that goes on. Masculine love pushes into the
future, asking roots, a thread of continuity.
. . .
Last night, Phaon took me among terra-cotta lamps,
their wicks flaming coldly. Perspiration glowed on our
bodies. A cat jumped on our bed and Phaon pushed it away:
wind rustled: leaves shook: flames swayed: this was the
love I had wanted and I accepted it and made it live: no
little girl’s love, mine was glorious, damning all
loneliness, knowing he would be gone again.
A dried flying fish revolved on a string above Phaon’s
cabin door. His boat rose on a gradual swell, seemed
unwilling to glide down.
“Let me sail with you when you sail next time,” I said.
“How could I take care of you?”
“Right in this cabin.”
“Would you sleep on the floor?”
“Why not?”
“What about food? Food goes bad...our cheese
spoils...our meat...our water. Sometimes we can’t land a
fish.”
A smile wrinkled his face, as he hulked against the
cabin wall, his smile vaguely reassuring.
“What about the heat and cold?” he went on.
“I was hungry and cold in exile.”
“That was...years ago.”
The flying fish spun, and I thought about time. Had so
many years lapsed? I said no more. He had silenced me
effectively for I could not endure those prolonged trials
and no doubt the sea voyage was impossible: luxury had
softened me. The spinning fish would have horrified
Atthis. And was I very different?
But we sailed along our coast, hugging it, unloading
fruit, getting away from the windless heat of Mytilene,
selling dates, lemons and limes. As we sailed in a faint
wind, the crew sang. Lolling under an awning, I heard
stories of catches at the deeps just beyond us, deeps
where the water shimmered flatly, as if of rock. One
crewman, not much bigger than a monkey, dove for shells
while we crept through shallows. Pink shell in hand,
treading a wave nakedly, he offered me his prize, as I
leaned over the side. Kelp floated around him and tiny
blue fish darted in and out, under his legs and arms,
angel fish lower down, perhaps frightened.
While the monkey-man dove for shells, youngsters swam
from small boats, hailing us, boarding us, some bringing
fish as gifts. A blond, husky body, his shoulders thickly
oiled, shared an orange with a girl who had his oval face
and fair skin: twins, I thought, and went to the stern to
talk to them, comparing their arms and legs, their
features and hair. The flock of youngsters cluttering our
desk found us amusing and laughed at us.
The twins talked about a wrecked ship, “from a strange
land...you can see her at dawn, when the water’s
quiet...she has a sunken deck, a huge rudder turned by
chains. A great red and gold beast is carved over the
stern...”
As we shared our oranges, juice trickled between her
breasts.
Someone shouted and there was more laughter, and, as if
prearranged, the youngsters abandoned us, dove overboard
and swam shoreward, splashing, calling, wishing us luck.
I wish I were that young, I told myself.
That night, heat lightning brushed the sky, forming
kelp-shaped ropes of yellow. Huge clouds massed about a
thin moon and Phaon prophesied rain.
My head on his lap, we drifted, watching, listening to
a singer, invisible man at the bow. His words made me
uneasy as he sang of lovers lost at sea. Our sail had
enough wind to fill it and yet we appeared immobile.
I drew Phaon’s face to mine and his mouth tasted of
oranges.
Above us, behind us, his flying fish rocked.
The lightning played among the stars and wet the sail
and our helmsman bent sleepily over the rudder: it was a
night for love and when the cabin had cooled, Phaon and I
sought each other: he placed an orange in my hand, the
singing went on, the sea sobbed, the orange fell.
“Phaon?”
“What is it?”
Keep me, wait, go on, love me, don’t...I wanted to say
so much.
I caressed him, breathed him in, the sanctity, the
favor, the graciousness, the ephemeral. I wandered
through caves. I dove to the wreck of the red-gold ship.
I...
Later, we divided the orange and its sweet dribbled
over us and he pressed his mouth there and we laughed,
thinking with body.
I woke to see the moon sink below the ocean, to see how
beautiful he was, his ship and fish swaying as a fresh
wind clattered the sail.
Noon found us back in Mytilene.
PHAON
He is god in my eyes...
my tongue is broken;
a thin flame runs under
my skin; seeing nothing,
hearing only my own ears
drumming, I drip with sweat;
trembling shakes my body
and I turn paler than
dry grass. At such times
death isn’t far off.
Anaktoria’s flesh seems almost transparent—a sensuous
softness coming from inside. When my girls are dancing on
the terrace or in the garden, I wonder who is most
beautiful.
Kleis spins. Atthis bends, arms upflung. I see a grape-
tinted breast, fragile ankles. Yellow hair flies over
shoulders. Gyrinno’s throat is perfect. Malva’s thighs.
Look, Atthis and Anaktoria are dancing together. For an
instant, their lips meet.
Tiles are blue underfoot.
Our wonderful harpist, an old woman, watches with
burning, lidless eyes, remembering her naked days,
playing them back again.
Cypress are drenched with sun.
Winter has come and Alcaeus has changed.
Winter—Libus and Alcaeus sit in my cold room, waiting.
They have been waiting a long time for me; they were here
when I returned from my birthday trip.
Alcaeus’ face is deeper lined: it has been lined for
years but something has happened abruptly, pain has
pinched the flesh into new, tiny, angry wrinkles.
Friends have reported that he is drinking again and yet
this is more than drink because I realize it is inner
debauchery: the eyes cannot confess: instead, the voice
tells.
We huddle in our warm robes, the wind howling, and he
says, in this new voice:
“What has kept you? We’ve been waiting a long time.”
Libus says:
“We haven’t forgotten.”
“Or isn’t this the day?” Alcaeus asks peevishly.
“Of course it’s her day,” Libus says.
Alcaeus chuckles.
When was it, I kissed that face, admiring its
masculinity? His hands never trembled.
Wind shakes the house.
Mind travels to other days when we struggled in exile,
when Alcaeus, badly dressed, kept us in food, stealing,
conniving. Often there seemed no way to get by. I sat,
waiting, blind to life. That sort of blindness was
weakness on my part, or acceptance or hope. Listening,
while we drank, I asked what hope he had? He was deriving
some satisfaction from his relationship with Libus. There
seemed nothing else. Little by little, he forgot why he
had come to see me: happy birthday became grimaces,
guffawing, vituperations over battles. He and Libus grew
excited, enacting scenes with their hands, shuffling
their feet.
“This is how I beat off his genitals...”
Alcaeus roared, hand on his beard.
“I beat open his helmet...”
Yes, the war...
And in my room, I found relief listening to the wind,
remembering the boat’s passage to Limnos, my friends
there, the festival in the vineyard, flute and drum,
carom of bodies, laughter: Was it Felerian who laughed
that low pitched melodious laugh? Was it Marcus who
hurled his spear through the target? I erased Alcaeus: so
much of life demands voluntary forgetfulness!
My girls had clambered about me at the dock, detaining
me. Why does their love soften me? So often there are
petty squabbles but, at reunions, they dissolve: the
moment becomes a moment of accord, making life worthier:
Gyrinno insists on carrying my basket, another smooths my
scarf, another offers flowers. Kisses. They buzz into a
flurry of plans.
“Tomorrow, we’ll go up the mountain...”
“Tomorrow, we’ll...”
Ah-hah-who, ah hah-who, the quails cry, as night comes.
I light mama’s lamp, so smooth to the fingers after all
these years, like alabaster. The wick struggles into
flame, as if reluctant to leave the past.
My Etruscan wall girl comes alive.
“Ah-hah-who.”
I take off my chain and pearl cluster and lay them in
their scented box, pausing, sensing, dreaming.
Perhaps Phaon will be back soon—unexpectedly. I could
not remain longer in Limnos, thinking he might return—
tonight. I long for his mouth, the jerk of his legs, his
obelisko’s tyranny.
Hunger—let me sleep tonight, tired after the voyage.
No sooner have I returned than I am upset. Life is
constricted... I stand among Charaxos’ Egyptian
treasures, confronting him: a twisted, gilded serpent god
sneers at me: fragments of gold leaf blink: mellow gold
is underfoot: I sway, as I talk, my parasol clenched
across my belly.
“Now, I know,” I say to him.
“You know what?”
“That you schemed with Pittakos, to have me exiled,
with Alcaeus.”
“What?”
“After all these years I’ve found out. Stop lying. You
tried to get our home, that’s why you wanted me exiled.
What a brother you’ve been! What a fool I’ve been!”
For once he shut his mouth.
“During the war years you made many trips, to sell your
wines...refusing to help me financially...yours is a debt
you won’t pay...and you don’t care. I’ve dedicated my
life to writing...I live no lie. I work to make life
significant.
“And now, why have I come? To quarrel? No, to tell you
the truth. I’ve nothing more to say. I want you to know
that I know. It’s a satisfaction...”
I could have talked on, but I left, snapping open my
parasol, clutching Ezekias’ arm, walking swiftly, curbing
my pulse, hearing a seagull, the wind icy at the corners
of the town, dogs sleeping in the sun, carts passing.
I tried to believe something was settled, that life was
worth more for having told the truth. Yet, I wanted to
return to Charaxos, demand apologies and restitution,
apologies for impertinent, biased criticisms, as if
apology, like a brand, could stamp out wrong, as if there
were restitution for my cheated years.
Somehow, as I walked, as Ezekias chattered, Aesop
commiserated: his hunchback shoulders squared my
shoulders: his doll had the dignity of a scepter to prod
my spirit.
A tow-headed youth greeted us and I thought: I wish I
could have a son. Yes, to give birth again. That glory
cancels many defeats.
In Libus’ house, I turned to him and said:
“I told Charaxos what you told me weeks ago.”
“But I shouldn’t have told you, Sappho.”
“It was time I knew the truth.”
“And now you have an enemy,” he said.
“He has been my enemy all the time, Libus.”
We sat on his veranda, an agnus-castus sheltering us
from the wind. His boy brought us drinks.
“Are we better friends?” he asked.
“I trust you more.”
Tree shadows moved across his mouth and chin.
“Trust is not always friendship. I shouldn’t have
informed. How shallow we are, the best of us. We bungle.
Friendship, yours and mine, it’s hard to measure, perhaps
we shouldn’t try: isn’t it better left alone? Friendship,
that’s what we’ve had all these years...I overstepped
propriety.”
How pale Libus was, in his grey robe, shadows ridging
the fabric, chalking his face, thickening his lips,
greying his hair. His sandals moved nervously yet he
never moved his hands: they remained weighted to his lap.
I ate supper there, lingering with the ancientness of
his rooms, dark mosaics, the crowning of a king behind
him, Libus’ chair of white leather, the king in the
mosaic studying his crown, his jewels flashing red, a
hint of Corinth and a hint of Crete.
Remembering my shepherd visit, I wrote this:
EVENING STAR
Hesperus, you bring
Homeward all that
Dawn’s light disperses,
Bring home sheep,
Bring home goats,
Bring children home
To their mothers.
What is it urges the mind to seek beauty? What is the
challenge? Why go where there are no charts?
Beauty says it is a kind of love.
So, I make love, in my quiet room, the word symbolic of
man, life’s continuity, my paper taken from reeds and
trees. I write of birth, love, marriage and death,
sensing that the unrecorded is vaster than the recorded.
I sense the stumbling: the past could be a gigantic
storm, fog obliterating at moment of revelation, fog
fumbling from man to man, saying come, saying stop. The
past is a wave through which no swimmer passes. As surf
it inundates, then vanishes. On windy nights, it moans at
my window, beautiful and hideous. I struggle on.
I quote from my journal kept in exile:
For three days we have had little to eat,
days of quarrels, bitterness and savagery.
I gave myself to a merchant and he has
returned the favor by feeding Alcaeus and me.
We ate in the kitchen, glad to find
considerate slaves. We can remain long enough
to recover our strength, if not our hopes.
How I long for home and my servants, fish
as Exekias can prepare it, onions in Chian
wine, olives from Patmos. It helps to list
the good things. Surely they are not lost.
How wretched to cheat myself to keep alive,
to cheat the face, the mooning eyes, the
stupid mouth, the odor of flagrancy, the
disbelief...chattel, cringe, lie still,
perform.
Copying those lines I remembered things I have never
recorded, our filthy clothes, windowless room, flies,
thirst, sickness...Alcaeus in jail... I was
fined...authorities jeered at us...no sympathy, no luck
until Aesop, his fox, raven and rooster.
I never thought him brilliant but he was always
entertaining, agreeable about the smallest problem.
Nuances come to me, as he told of a turtle that ferried a
small turtle and then, at the end of the pleasant ride,
said:
“Little turtle, you must pay.”
“How can I pay?” asked the little turtle.
“By doing me a favor.”
“Well, what can I do?”
“Hump along the beach and snatch me a fly.”
“I’ll do my best,” said the little turtle.
After humping and snapping till almost noon, the little
turtle brought a fly to the big turtle. Finding the big
fellow asleep, the little one had to cuff him.
“Here,” said the turtle, between closed lips.
“Ah,” exclaimed the big turtle, swallowing the fly,
tasting it with care. “Umm, that’s the first fly I ever
ate! You see a little fellow like you can do things a big
fellow can’t.”
During the night an earthquake woke me and I wandered
through the bedrooms, to see about my girls. Atthis
needed covering and as I arranged her covers she
murmured, “Mama, mama.” Before I could slip away, she
grasped my hand.
“Are you homesick, darling?”
When I kissed her, I found her face wet with tears.
“Why don’t you go home for a few weeks?” I whispered.
“You were calling your mama in your sleep. If you’re
homesick, you must go home. Let’s talk about it tomorrow.
Do you want me to sleep with you?”
So we cuddled together and almost at once she relaxed
and, after a few endearments, slept with her head on my
shoulder, her violet fragrance around me. I held her
fingers a long time. Drowsily, I asked: where do we
go...why can’t we remain young...happy? The last thing I
recalled was the sweetness of her perfume.
The earthquake had been forgotten.
Alcaeus sat on his leather stool, his dog at his feet,
sunlight behind him; elbows on his knees, he said:
“...I prefer that hymn. There’s really no finer. In
spite of time it’s full of force, spring’s arrival, the
brevity of summer, the dying year. It has the shepherd’s
power, the forest’s—passion tamed and sanctified. Another
one I like is...
The woods decay, the woods decay and fall...
Libus, sitting near Alcaeus, quoted his favorite,
huddling in his robe, his face averted:
Alone, in sea-circled Delos, while round on
beach and cove,
before the piping sea wind the dark blue
storm waves drove...
“Why do you break off?” I asked.
He did not answer but said:
“They knew, those ancients, how to supplicate the
lowliest...they preferred the virginal...snowy
peaks...whispering groves...the hunting cry...”
Warming my feet on a warming stone, I said I preferred
the golden hymn and repeated fragments...
Long are their ways of living, honey in their
bread,
and in their dances their footsteps twirl,
twirling light...
Fragment of talk:
“We can’t marry, unless we have a child...you’ll be
twenty-three soon...it must be like that...my house is a
house of women...”
I thought of those words as I passed Phaon’s house,
beyond the wharf, isolated. As I passed, waves climbed
its base, licking at boulders. Its walls are thicker than
most, cracked and mottled. I used to be afraid of that
house as a girl and as I passed these thoughts brought
back some of that apprehension. I glanced at the seaward
balcony, tottering on wasted beams, painted years ago.
Seagulls squatted on the flat roof, as they have day in
and day out. There are five rooms underneath those tiles
and his mother and uncle lived and died there, a harsh
struggle in rooms of simple furnishings, coils of rope,
nets, brass fittings and bronze anchors.
Phaon lives there with two men, their servants and a
hanger-on. Kleis visits occasionally. A parrot, some say
nearly two hundred years old, gabbles sayings and fills
the sea-sopped silences.
Yes, his house troubles me—its darkness, its evocation
of poverty and my own exile.
While I was ill, Libus cared for me, the mastery of his
hands relieving pain. By my bed, talking soothing talk,
he brought gradual relief, just as two years ago. His
hands are more than hands, it seems. Magical masseur, he
explores yet never gropes: his fingers, padded at the
tips, press, release, wait. Our friendship, with all its
confidences, in spite of differences, weathers the years
and is stronger at such a time, under his mastery. As he
obliterates pain, he blinks absently or smiles his pale
smile, withdrawn yet assuring. He learned his art from a
young Alexandrian, a man he met while studying in Athens,
who spoke many desert languages.
“I’d like to see him again. I’ve learned something
through my own experiments; we would share. Of course,
he’s a great man.”
And when I asked Libus about my illness, he said:
“Too much work, too much rich food, too much concern.
You haven’t been using common sense.”
I didn’t care for this and said:
“I know from what Alcaeus says, you help him more than
anyone. You can help me.”
“I’m not able to help him all the time.”
“You mean his drinking?”
He shrugged.
“Let’s call it something else. He does nothing so much
of the time. That’s where the trouble lies. He’s not
thinking...doesn’t care.”
“He wouldn’t let me in when I went last. Thasos had to
turn me away.”
“The great soldier...drunk.”
“What can I do?”
“Try again, Sappho. You and I know what he is—and was.
You used to understand him better than anyone. Now, well,
I do what I can. He’s growing worse...have you heard him
bellow at me or Thasos, as if he were commanding officer?
No doubt you have...and more...”
Libus’ hands pushed and then, feather-weight, stroked
upward, over and over, inducing me to breathe steadily:
his hands brought warmth, my thinking became clearer. As
he pressed, the weight on my heart lessened; as his
fingers covered my stomach, rotating their tips, I felt
bitter anguish might not come again.
Lecturing me, he cautioned me about food and advised
less exercise: rest, let the days flow by.
So, I sail with my girls, lie in the sun, walk, poke
along lazy trails, fuss in my garden. Winter is hard on
me. Chills come, leaving my stomach knotted, my eyes
afire.
Phaon has returned.
Phaon and Sappho kneel in a grove,
a cithara beside them:
age-old trees shade the lovers:
the age of a ruined temple is part of
the timelessness of the grove:
bronze Phaon and white Sappho,
dusk takes over their whispers,
their motions, the wind in the olives.
Mytilene
U
nder the olive trees we faced each other, alone, the sun
coloring the ground, patching yellow and brown. A
butterfly circled, as if considering us. Tenderly, Phaon
fitted his hands over my breasts and I held him in my
arms; swaying, we kissed: we had not talked much and we
knew talk could come later: his legs crowded mine: his
hand undid my hair, spilling it over my shoulders:
confirmation was in that undisturbed place and accord
burned our mouths and throats. Encystment was the
slipping down of robes, our knees touching, the feeling,
self, and underneath self, the ground, our earth: yet we
were not aware, only before and later: the consummation
dragged at the trees: I forced him to me, forcing back
his face, his mouth: how warm his stamina: tenderly, we
rose, to fall back: tenderness, how it becomes ash,
taking us by surprise: I couldn’t stop quivering till his
hands stopped me: his voice was real so all was real:
then, he was home and this was not a lie: I knew it on
the slope of hills sloping to the ocean: I knew it in the
boat, far at sea.
When we learned of a terrible earthquake at Chios, we
loaded Libus’ boat with food, wine and water and set out,
before dawn, across choppy water, Phaon and I at the
stern, under blankets, Libus managing the sail. We were
part of a small fleet but I couldn’t discern another
boat. Spray swished overhead and fog, ahead and astern,
seemed ready to pincer us. Under our hull the water
flooded ominously; the sky, without its stars, might have
been the ocean.
Our hard trip brought us into Chios tired and hungry;
we had been unable to look after ourselves but, without
eating, we began to distribute food and wine.
Chios—happy town—lay broken. I walked about,
remembering, stopping here and there: all the central
part, shops and temple, were dismembered, had windy dust
blowing across it, greyish dust that seemed mortuary.
Yet, I saw no dead, only the injured: Libus helped them,
bandaging, talking: I gave wine and water, afraid: he was
annoyed by my fear: I could not find Phaon and that wor-
ried me. Wine, and water, dribbling them, my hamper
shaking, the wind icy and dust in my mouth, I felt sick
again. A child raced to me, wailing: crouching down, I
mothered her, fed her a little bread: as we crouched, a
slab of building fell, tottered forward and disappeared
in a wave of dust.
“The quake came and came and then came again,” an
injured woman said, accepting dates and cheese.
By now, I saw others from Mytilene and their hearty
faces cheered me. But how the gulls screamed. Flocks
wheeled and screamed.
On the beach we lit fires and cooked our suppers, wind
and dust still bothering us: Phaon and I ate with people
from home, our fire put together from the prow of an old
boat, the talk about Chios and the injured, their lack of
food and care. We slept in beached boats, the surf
snarling, stars breaking through fast clouds: I
remembered the big dipper and frightened people... Libus
woke us early and we did our best to help, using splints,
caring for a head wound, bandaging a boy’s chest... Libus
scarcely allowed himself time to eat.
The wind had subsided, and I felt less fear and went
about with my basket of food and wine. In the afternoon,
we welcomed other boats from Lesbos and after a second
night on the beach—this one calm, all the stars awake—we
sailed for home, three of us leaving at the same time,
our boats so many grey corks on a line.
As I stared back at the stricken town, I heard the
gulls. “Phaon, it was bad,” I said.
“Yes, very bad, though I’ve seen worse.”
“I hope I never do.”
“These people had help...sometimes there is nobody to
help.”
“We’re in the lead,” Libus cried. “We’ll be the first
ones home. Now for some sleep.”
(
Today, I had a letter from Solon: he discussed politics and his immediate in-
tentions and then went on to consider my poetry, praising it for its lyrical quality,
refreshing themes, compassion and sense of beauty.
I respect his judgment and his quotations sent me to my books, to reconsider
and evaluate. For a while, I sat at my desk, thinking over passages, contemplating
the ocean, serenely blue as usual. Life, for the moment, was balanced: it had
acquired profundity and calm: here was my reward since I believed his assess-
ments just: for once, I needed no one to share: I needed nothing.
But I picked up Aesop’s clay fox and recognized my need: the bite of yester-
day cornered me.
(
Kleis has fallen in love—this time with a cousin of Pittakos. I am amused,
and have done all I dare to make the pair happy, picnicking and boating.