The Last Song of Sappho

Thou peaceful night, thou chaste and silver ray
Of the declining Moon; and thou, arising
Amid the quiet forest on the rocks,
Herald of day: O cherished and endeared,
Whilst Fate and doom were to my knowledge closed,
Objects of sight! No lovely land or sky
Doth longer gladden my despairing mood.
By unaccustomed joy we are revived
When o'er the liquid spaces of the Heavens
And o'er the fields alarmed doth wildly whirl
The tempest of the winds; and when the car,
The ponderous car of Jove, above our heads
Thundering, divides the heavy air obscure.
O'er mountain peaks and o'er abysses deep
We love to float amid the swiftest clouds;
We love the terror of the herds dispersed,
The streams that flood the plain,
And the victorious, thunderous fury of the main.

Fair is thy sight, O sky divine, and fair
Art thou, O dewy earth! Alas, of all
This beauty infinite, no slightest part
To wretched Sappho did the Gods or Fate
Inexorable give. Unto thy reign
Superb, O Nature, an unwelcome guest
And a disprized adorer, doth my heart
And do mine eyes implore thy lovely forms;
But all in vain. The sunny land around
Smiles not for me, nor from ethereal gates
The blush of early dawn; not me the songs
Of brilliant feathered birds, not me the trees
Salute with murmuring leaves; and where in shade
Of drooping willows doth a liquid stream
Display its pure and crystal course, from my
Advancing foot the soft and flowing waves
Withdrawing with affright,
Disdainfully it takes through flowery dell its flight.

What fault so great, what guiltiness so dire,
Did blight me ere my birth, that adverse grew
To me the brow of fortune and the sky?
How did I sin, a child, when ignorant
Of wickedness is life, that from that time
Despoiled of youth, and of its fairest flowers,
The cruel Fates wove with relentless wrath
The web of my existence? Reckless words
Rise on thy lips; the events that are to be,
A secret council guides. Secret is all,
Our agony excepted. We were born,
Neglected race, for tears; the reason lies
Amid the gods on high. Oh cares and hopes
Of early years! To beauty did the Sire,
To glorious beauty an eternal reign
Give o'er this humankind; for warlike deed
For learned lyre or song,
In unadorned shape, no charms to fame belong.

Ah, let us die! The unworthy garb divested,
The naked soul will take to Dis its flight,
And expiate the cruel fault of blind
Dispensers of our lot. And thou, for whom
Long love in vain, long faith and fruitless rage
Of unappeased desire assailed my heart,
Live happily, if happily on earth
A mortal yet hath lived. Not me did Jove
Sprinkle with the delightful liquor from
The niggard urn, since of my childhood died
The dreams and fond delusions. The glad days
Of our existence are the first to fly;
And then disease and age approach, and last,
The shade of frigid Death. Behold! of all
The palms I hoped for, and the errors sweet,
Hades remains; and the transcendent mind
Sinks to the Stygian shore
Where sable night doth reign, and silence evermore.