Sappho: Aeolic Fragment

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Apple orchard, Villeneuve-sur-Lot, south-west France: photo by DSHover, August 2005

Frae the Aiolic o Psappho

Caller rain frae abune
reeshles among the epple-trees:
the leaves are soughan wi the breeze,
and sleep faas drappan doun.



reeshles = rustles

Douglas Young: Frae the Aiolic o Psappho, from A Baird o Thristles: Scots Poems, 1947

Tanew Nature Reserve, Poland: photo by Merlin, 2006

 

...Rain, a breeze, Aeolic
Within the cool trough of apple-wood
There is a rustle, air, water move,
...Sleep sifts through the leaves

Red-figure vase by the Group of Polygnotos, ca. 440–430 BC. Seated, Sappho is reading one of her poems to a group of three student-friends: photo by Marsyas, 22 December 2005 (National Archaeological Museum, Athens)

     αμφὶ δ᾽ ὔδωρ
ψῖχρον ὤνεμοσ κελάδει δἰ ὔσδων
μαλίνων, αἰθυσσομένων δὲ φύλλων
     κῶμα κατάρρει.

 

Marble head of Sappho, found at Smyrna, near present-day Izmir,Turkey: photo by Bjorn Christian Torresen, 2009 (Istanbul Archeological Museum)

Sapphic fragment: text from Greek Lyric I: Sappho and Alcaeus, ed. D.A. Campbell (Loeb Classical Library)

Rain, a breeze, Aeolic: TC version