oughbred body? No, it was the conjunction of these and the very thought, this
summary, increased my sense of loss. He was warmth, impulse, reason for living.
Words! And he was more than words!
By now the dot had disappeared and against the clouds, birds wheeled and
drifted and scattered raindrops fell, scenting the air. I went out and let them wet
my face and take away the sting and then closed the shutters of my room and lay
down.
Rain has such music.
I let it lull me to sleep, sleep, in the morning, warm, in my bed, a day or a
year...sleep...was it from the depth of the sea?
That night a storm engulfed us, ransacking our trees, banging our shutters,
moaning over the roof until Atthis got into bed with me, thoroughly scared.
“Don’t be afraid, darling.”
“I am...I am...Aren’t you?”
“No...maybe a little.”
“What about Phaon?”
“He’s far at sea by this time.”
“But isn’t that bad, to be far at sea?”
“I don’t know...hush.”
I resented her pliant body and scented arms and hair: yes, at sea, Phaon must
be battling gigantic combers: his cargo might shift...his sail might... When Atthis
hugged me, I felt stifled and yet, as she quieted and the storm continued, I was
grateful I could comfort her. If I could not have Phaon, I, at least, had someone
who loved and needed me.
Rain and wind knocked open the shutters and I rose and closed them and
dried my feet and got into bed again.
Floor tiles had chilled me.
Rain cuffed roof and sides of the house... I heard the surf growing wilder,
sloshing over rocks, climbing the lower cliffs, rising and falling onto itself with a
hiss.
I straightened my hair on my pillow, knowing I had hours to wait: I said,
you’ve seen a lot of storms, sleep. Your island isn’t in danger. But, nothing could
keep me from thinking of his boat and its struggle. I named off members of his
crew. I named their families.
Phaon’s cousin was with him—a wretched re-initiation, after those hideous
days on the raft.
I heard Anaktoria and Gyrinno talking in the next room.
I thought of the madman, living with Alcaeus, walking about with him: I’ll
make something of him, Alcaeus had said to me, the face revealing that his mad-
ness had not left him.
Joy and exaltation are the triumphs...
today is the imminence...
even shadows have their fire...
the stars burn...
O, sea rover, fight...
(
THE STORM SPLIT ROOFS AND HURLED BOATS ASHORE, UPROOTING TREES,
DAMAGING WALLS.
Slowly, the old town pulls itself together.
Old town—you have seen many storms during your centuries. Is it true, you
let this one slip past you and sent it to sea? You should have kept it! You can
withstand battering better than a small ship! Is it true, what the fishermen say,
that many were drowned?
Men and boys go about town, picking up tiles to load their baskets.
Driftwood clutters the beach.
(
Men were hurling stones, grabbing them off the beach and throwing them. I
heard them hit Pittakos and saw him stagger, his flapping rags jerking, his arm
flung over his eyes. Silent, feet wide apart, he stayed his ground.
Alcaeus, facing the sea, lidless-eyed, roared and lunged about, arms extended,
yelling:
“Kill him...kill him...let me wring his neck!”
Beside him, the madman off the raft, howled and hurled stones.
About a dozen men were circling Pittakos, most of them blabbing defiance,
closing in.
I rushed to Alcaeus and squeezed past him, to cry out... I told them to stop,
asking them to stop in the name of our island, our town.
“Get back,” Alcaeus warned.
I faced them, feeling their hate: it bubbled through me, seemed to ooze from
the sand, from the sea, from antiquity: the hates of my ancestors, hatred of tyr-
anny and unfairness.
No one threw: they watched me, as I walked toward Pittakos: maybe they
thought I had a stone.
“You get back,” I cried. “Go home, before they kill you, Pittakos. Get back
everyone...go home.”
Nervously folding and unfolding his robe, Pittakos backed away. A hand
went to a spot where a stone must have struck. I felt no pity but stepped closer.
“I don’t know what caused these men to turn on you... I don’t want to
know...go home, before it’s too late.”
Without replying, he shuffled away, a sandal off.
“Is he going?” asked Alcaeus, finding me, hand on my shoulder.
“Let him go,” I said, facing the others.
Grasping Alcaeus, I forced him to walk with me, muttering to him, seeing
Thasos, dropping his stones with a guilty grin.
I wanted to forget the faces but I knew most of the men: young, bearded
faces, most of them friends of Alcaeus, some of them his soldiers.
“Don’t lead me,” Alcaeus protested.
“You need to be led.”
“You came at the wrong time.”
“What’s to become of you?”
“Let me go,” he said.
“I’ll see you home. Here, Thasos, take his arm. Thasos, were you mad?”
“We should have stoned him.”
“Why?”
“He quarreled with Alcaeus—spat on him.”
(
Alcaeus leaned on me and I sensed his weariness as if it were mine: he was
breathing hard and had to rest, stopping again and again. Behind us, his madman
wandered, his Pamphilus.
“I’m too old for this kind of horseplay, it seems.”
Thasos and I were saddened by his tragic features; we frowned; minute wrin-
kles had enlarged and deepened; his hands trembled; his mouth was open. He
seemed in the past, with his men, galled, waiting: What is memory for, I asked
myself, to crucify? Shut off from the day, is this the best memory can do?
When I sat with him at home, I said:
“What was the quarrel about?”
“First, some water.”
Thasos brought us water. The cool of his gourd helped.
“Pittakos has stolen from the city...again...I came at him with the facts...I
know the truth...many of us know.”
We remained silent a while, my hand in his.
“It’s an old truth—for us,” I said.
“Very old,” he said.
Presently, the madman entered, carrying himself stiffly, chalk faced, chastised.
Oblivious of us, appearing more normal than any time I had seen him, he talked
with Thasos, regretting the incident.
Soft-talking men, inside an inner room, brought home to me the. innocence
of our own lives, how based on impulse, how like kelp, twisting, sinking, headed
for shore, dragged to sea: we are mad, we are sane, or between: we exert our-
selves and the world seeks revenge; we accept and earn ridicule and belittlement:
we affirm ourselves and alter our lives and the lives of others: war is such an
affirmation.
Innocence? Why not call all life innocent because dependability can not be
assured. And, if life is innocent, then what is there but compassion and patience
and kindness and beauty and love?
“It would have been better if they had killed him,” Alcaeus said, rubbing his
hands over his face.
I said nothing.
“I could have him murdered,” he said.
“Alcaeus...wait...”
“WAIT? HOW MUCH LONGER MUST WE WAIT?”
“He’s old.”
“Are we children?”
“He knows what’s happening.”
“No—not even yet.”
“That couldn’t be.”
I saw Pittakos by the sea, spray dampening his clothes, his mouth to the gulls:
I saw him, hand over eyes, legs spread; I heard stones hitting him... I could take
no more and saying good-bye to Alcaeus, I walked home, eager to be alone, for
now the town seemed withdrawn, callous, incomplete, a failure. I touched a
hollow in a wall and picked a leaf and, where a street opened on the bay, looked
and looked: the sea’s salty taste acted as a philter and years of contentment and
ease surged about me, trying to reinstate themselves: my girls met me and we
went home together, sharing our innocence.
Just the other day, I dreamed of Serfo’s place, his
fabrics around me, things from Assyria, Egypt and Persia.
Some of the cloth blew against me, light as a Sudanese
veil. Atthis had a length of it in her hands, a twisted
flowered piece yards long.
“I’ll make ribbons for your hair,” she said.
Alone, I sank into patterns, colors and textures.
Something brushed my cheek, a winged bull in gold on blue
cotton... I saw an imperial snake in green on white silk,
a mighty roc in black on grey wool... I heard friends
asking prices, Anaktoria, Libus.
I heard mother say:
“This is the best, this one, darling, with temples and
shields on it, this blue, soft blue! Don’t you love it?
Here, take it in your hands, press it to your face.”
I saw ships and listened to their keels...sailors
unloading bales...wasn’t that a remnant on the water?
(
A suffusion of light envelopes the Venus de Milo,
revealing the contours and texture of her hair,
face, breasts, belly, and drapery.
Voices sing Homeric hymns.
A woman, as lovely as the Milo,
disappears in the golden light
beneath the Mediterranean.
Villa Mytilene
W
as it three years ago I met Atthis—five years ago Anaktoria? Was that another
dream? I am not sure.
Awake, I thought about my girls and now much they love me and make my
house a house of grace. I must have beauty: I must have peace: and they are
peace and beauty. I recalled how and when I had met each and loved each one
for her special qualities. Each had a place in my heart, gold on cotton, green on
white...the sea was at each meeting and at each good-bye... I count my years but
the sea has no calendar.
Sometimes I feel the sea thinks for us, its pensiveness communicates at dawn,
its meditation at night, its probity sifting through the day. A stormy emotion—
the sea. A period of tranquility—the sea. Fickleness—the sea. I could not be
happy without its communication. For all its pervasiveness it seems on the verge
of a secret: looking down through the waves I sense it, I sense it at night, when
phosphorescence steals shoreward or when rain obliterates and there is no visi-
ble ocean, then, still, still it communes, insinuating mystery, legends from caves,
legends stronger than any coral, barracuda and stingrays roiled under, sinking
farther and farther.
(
As we eat, in the dining room, Atthis prattles about her new parrot, mimick-
ing it.
Her glances, charming, rounded, sensual, inconclusive, ask for love.
Her mimicry, spoken somewhat under her breath, takes in the townspeople,
theatre folk, the Athenian star, Alcaeus, Gogu, the girls. But, because it is kindly
and feminine, the fun carries far.
Her eyebrows have grown to meet over her nose and the fuzzy little bridge
gives her added years. Her breasts are larger, shoulders fuller. She could be a
priestess: the face solemn, the lips pert; then laughter ruins everything and she is
simply girl, joyous life, asking for love.
Dressed in thin summer best, she pokes her neighbor
with her sharp sandal and before I can say a word a scrap
follows.
(
As I went downstairs, I put my hand between the lion’s jaws, stubby, mossy
stone, oldest part of the house. Lingering, I watched leaves puff down the steps.
By the fountain, I absorbed water shadows, warmth around me, an insect swim-
ming toward a spot of sun.
(
A village girl brought me a bouquet of white roses, saying:
“You must let me join your hetaerae.”
She wore a twisted blue wool skirt, of darkest color, and no blouse. Standing
erect, she offered her flowers and then spun around and fled: I could scarcely
take in the clean-cut features, pointed chin, red mouth and new breasts.
I can’t imagine who she is or where she lives but I must find her.
(
My working hours are longer and as I review my work I find it good: that is a
sign of maturity: maturity is the seal I strive for and yet as I work I fear a loss of
spirit: maturity is seldom daring and to be daring is to open doors: maturity,
then, is balance: is it also the decorum people accuse me of? Parasol, tilted at just
the proper angle? Mask, worn at the right moments? As I came home yesterday
from the play, I remembered a winking mask, rather like one in my room: was
that derision?
(
I saw a young man on the street who startled me. Though he didn’t glance at
me, I thought I had seen him in Samnos: ax beard and sullen mouth were the
same; he had the same slouch, the same filthy clothes. Watching him, I recalled
that Samnian fellow, his pleas and questions:
“...tell nobody I’m here...but I want to know about home...tell me the news!
You see I’ve been here for three years...to escape the war...there are three of
us...we came here on a raft...tell us...”
The frenzied talk was vivid as this derelict walked down our street.
In Samnos, I had sympathized with my countryman for his voluntary exile
was no easier than an enforced exile: I drew him out and later met his friends, all
hungry for news, all in rags, living from hand to mouth, scared. It was their fear
that worried me and I urged them to make friends and forget the past, to marry
and begin life in Samnos. I arranged contacts for them...
But, was this one of them sneaking along, hoping for luck? Pittakos, the wise,
the clement, would have him lashed to death by nightfall, if someone discovered
him. My pledge of secrecy is a pledge I’ll keep. As I sailed home from Samnos, I
thought of these men and was proud of their folly.
(
Roses are in bloom on the hills and violets are in flower around my house.
Kleis will be married soon, so I am doing things wrong. I try to tell myself this is
her happiest time and struggle to write a poem for her wedding. Her natural
gaiety is infectious and yet, and yet...
We will have quite a ceremony, Libus, Alcaeus, Gogu, Nanno, Helen, my
girls, sailors, half the town, Pittakos and rogues...Rhodopis and Charaxos...no,
harshness is not in keeping with a wedding.
I can hear the male chorus.
I hear the surf...
Below us, the ocean eats at its rocks, above us lie the hills, around us stir the
branches of the olives.
Peace: sacred grove, we dedicate these two: give them luck: a light will fall:
the chorus will resume: a wreath will be hung.
Shall I play my harp?
Who is the god of illusion? Love? How is he to be kept alive through many
years and many disappointments?
I shall try to help. Song has that gift, a gift nothing else has: to give the lost or
hold it in suspension.
(
I feel utterly ridiculous, the greatest hypocrite: that is how it seems as I urge
Alcaeus to curb his resentment for Pittakos.
I have tried reason but it isn’t reason that moves Alcaeus. When he feels my
sympathy, he listens: if he conceives of us as he used to be, his hatred subsides.
Let him feel alone, he thunders, bends toward me, drags his fingers through his
beard and sputters:
“To hear you talk, I’d think you were never mistreated by this man!”
“But you know better.”
“You’re a traitor to yourself!”
“That’s not true. You want to have him killed and I say we lose through vio-
lence. I’m no traitor to myself—or you. You can be traitor to justice.”
“Let’s not say anything about justice, when we’re fighting tyranny.”
I recalled days with Aesop and said:
“I wish he was here, to advise us or hear our problems.
I think I know what he’d say.”
“What?”
“There’s a way out of slavery... I didn’t kill my
master.”
Slavery—there are all kinds.
It is a kind of slavery to long for Phaon and another
kind to remember Aesop and another to hope. Perhaps Aesop
would rebuke such thinking and say: Slavery is not in
ourselves but in the misused power of others. Surely that
is the commoner kind but I find slavery in myself and my
girls and my island and my books.
Well, here is a story Phaon told me:
“Years ago, a slave broke into a temple on a deserted
island and found lamps burning. On a rug lay a naked man,
asleep. He’d been lying there for centuries, guarded by
someone, the lamps filled and the wicks new.
“The King of Freedom, were the words on a shield beside
him. His yellow hair streamed across the rug. Above him,
a mask, fastened on the wall, spoke:
“ ‘Shut the temple...let the lamps burn...make no
noise...take a hair from his head...go.’
“The slave shut the temple, carefully.
“Years later, in prison, he bent over to examine the
golden hair he had kept and it burst into flame and
became a torch which he used to light his way to
freedom.”
His flames and heat are fuel
For seaman’s muscles, his sea eyes,
Devil of laughter and devil moods,
His sinking-rising delicacy.
The initial union is relief
Of olives and cypress, breasts, birds,
Stinging and perspiration’s siege,
Roots climbing out of centuries.
Beauty, the wedding is over and I am alone with my
lighted lamps and moonlight across the sea, night’s
indifference.
Beauty, Kleis was happy...many of us were happy.
After the ceremony, Pittakos approached me, shuffling,
dressed as I had never seen him dressed, in fine white
clothes. His hate was gone, that was something I saw at
once: I was seeing another man. Speaking guardedly, hands
folding and unfolding his robe, he said:
“...They would have stoned me. What can I say...to make
amends? You stopped them from killing me... You...you
helped me...”
I grew confused. Remembering Alcaeus’ threat, my hatred
surged and I thought: Can he expect me to rub out the
past because of an accident on my part? Can he ask such a
thing?
Do you think that I have changed—that I went out of my
way to save you?
My own harshness pained me. I had seen him at a
distance, during the ceremony, and had resented his
presence; as I played my harp and sang he remained near,
boggling his head.
Our sacred grove, filled with people, trees streaked
with fog, was still in my mind. I could see Kleis smiling
and hear the wedding chorus, the flutists, the barking
dogs, the cries of gulls.
Glancing overhead, I noticed them, passing, gliding,
saying with their grace things I tried to say in my
writing.
Pittakos turned away.
I could not say a word but stepped forward.
“...Pittakos.”
He regarded me doubtfully.
“Yes.”
Then I started to walk away.
“What can I say? I’m old... I can’t erase errors.
Sappho, I... Last night I stayed up all night...it was
more than thinking: I looked at the past. I’ve been
mistaken. Though we’ve lived here, in this town, we know
only lies about each other...”
Shuffling, he made off.
All were there in the grove: Alcaeus, baffled; Libus,
pale and aloof; Anaktoria, gay; Atthis, dreaming; Kleis,
my herder... We ate together, drank, sang... The sun
drank the fog and sunset ribboned the ocean.
I shall remember goats wandering through our grove,
tinkling their bells...the mask-maker carrying my harp
for me...trying to sing in toothless ecstasy...I shall
remember the altar fire and wreaths of flowers, their
incense and coloring... remember, too, the farewell of my
pair, their backs and shoulders as they headed for their
house on the headland, a small place among figs and tall
white poppies, their world—not mine. I must remember it
is their world. When Kleis flings her arms around me I
will rejoice. At the same time, I must accept the fact
that their marriage is their particular freedom.
May it be a satisfying freedom.
Mother’s lamp, as I write, is nearly empty: she would
have liked the wedding ceremony, the chorus singing my
poem: terra-cotta lamp, do you remember her wedding? Did
you burn for her ecstasy or were you snuffed out before
the groom carried her to bed?
It wasn’t long ago I was married: how I walked, my head
high, the embodiment of innocence and grace: I thought
life would be easy!
The wind puffs through my room.
The ocean whispers.
Charaxos and Rhodopis attended the wedding, staying
apart with a group of their friends, no one dressed for
the occasion. Since the man who had forcibly made love to
her was there, I was disconcerted. I was ashamed. My face
burned. What could I do? Would they interfere? But they
seemed preoccupied, merely onlookers, most of them young
men and women.
When they sauntered away, I enjoyed the wedding.
Someone among them, a stranger perhaps, gazed back at
me, reminding me of Cercolas.
Cercolas, my mother, Aesop—each summons a series of
images. When each one died, I thought: How can I go on?
Now my thought is: What has replaced them? Husband,
mother, friend... I am forever altered by their absence,
emptier, lonelier. I seek them in others and yet never
find them.
It matters to me how they died.
I am still troubled that Cercolas died on the
battlefield. And it is tragic that Aesop died, beaten by
a mob. At least, mother died beside me, comforted as much
as human comfort is possible.
Death should not catch us unaware for then it cheats us
doubly. Surely, it is hard enough to die without dying in
some tragic way. Each of us deserves a last dignity.
Shall I tell Alcaeus that Pittakos came to me after the
wedding?
I may never tell him because he will suffer more for
knowing. It seems to me telling him could accomplish
little. Hard as it is, unfair as it is, I must keep this
to myself. Of course, some would disbelieve. And if
Pittakos sees fit to remain silent, he and I will be
better off. Lives will be less complicated.
Even unmolested, he has not much time ahead. We must be
far-sighted and choose a leader...
Homosexual lovers in bed,
making love in the moonlight.
The light falls on their flesh,
faces, hands, legs, their passion:
laughter and soft moans and
the ocean below the villa.
Sappho rises and ponders her body,
stands by a window, facing the Aegean.
I took my lyre and said:
Here, now, my heavenly
Tortoise shell, become
A speaking instrument.
O
ne by one, the poems have fitted into my book, so slowly
time seems to have had nothing to do with its completion.
Yet, my ninth book is done. When I had finished my sixth,
I thought: this is all. When I finished my eighth, I felt
I need go no farther. Will there be a tenth? What will
make it distinctive?
Phaon lives in this book, insatiability floods
everywhere: lyric by lyric, our smoldering hearts reveal
our happiness.
When I shared lines with him, he laughed at their
frankness, eyes dancing. He remembered some of them, and
shot them back at me, to tease.
I have sent selections to Solon: what will he write me?
Will their crudeness be too much for him? I think not. He
has savored love.
My Egyptians are copying the book—conspirators, no
doubt, mumbling lines to each other, shaking heads. I’d
like to slip into their shop as they work, to overhear
them: would I laugh or recoil? Probably I’d be annoyed.
Well, tomorrow I must go to the shop and see how they are
doing.
I have not thought of a title.
Villa Poseidon
I sought Anaktoria and together we spent the night.
In spite of her comfort, I could not get to sleep. Her
arms around me, she lay motionless.
During the afternoon, we arranged flowers, taking them
from the garden. A rainbow appeared over the bay and arm
in arm we watched it, its arc faintly reflected on the
water. Her myrrh was everywhere, her spirit too: the
things she said were right: family traditions are a part
of her and she adds just enough fantasy.
For a while, we practiced archery, her shooting more
accurate than mine. A lost arrow sent us near the sea.
Then games...games...what would life be without games and
laughter!
Watch the dice in her fingers!
She’s a magician of tricks and youth, my Anaktoria and,
oddly enough, I can never bring it all together; it is
too effervescent, too delightful: the moment swells over
us: then, another moment, even while we are eating
together, growing sleepy together: ours is a gift that
has come from our island without men, years of
femininity.
Someone sent me the doll Aesop had when he died, his
Cretan doll. It came from Adelphi; badly wrapped, I
opened it in my library, laid it on my desk, amazed to
see it, startled, fingers fumbling. Someone had wanted to
be kind, but it wasn’t kindness to send it. What faded
colors, what worn cloth, how had the doll gotten this
old? It had suffered another kind of death.
With the doll in my arms, I smelled the incense of his
house, dinner on the table, fresh fruit piled before us:
the broad bracelet he wore bothered him and he shoved it
higher on his arm: silent tonight, he listened to what we
had been doing during the day: he had such heart for
Alcaeus and me.
I could not keep the figure but packed it away. Its
evocative intimacy, its forlorn quality...they would
serve no purpose I could think of. I was glad Alcaeus
could not see it. Yet, I felt I had rejected Aesop.
A sweltering day was made worse when Gogu had a seizure
near Serfo’s shop. Serfo and Libus carried him inside and
I found them working over Gogu, kneeling beside him,
Serfo’s slave fanning the sick man, swaying his palm
frond low, Libus’ face tense and canvas-colored. Serfo
turned his barbaric features, square-cut beard and
blazing green eyes, on me, resentful when I placed a damp
sponge on Gogu’s head, when I suggested we pull him
farther away from the wall. He growled and backed off, to
care for some customers.
“Is it Gogu’s old trouble?” I asked.