Sappho To Phaon (ovid Heroid Xv) Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABCDDEEFFGHIIJJBCKK JJLMLLNNOOJJJJPPAAJJ NNAAKKAAQQBCRRSTAAAA UUNNAAAAJJVVJJNNAAJJ EEJJAAJJBCWXJJVVFFYY JJQQJJZA2JJAAAAZZB2B 2A2C2OOAAAAEEAAD2E2N NJJJJLLNNAAUUJJKKF2G 2JJH2H2D2E2I2I2JJCCE 2E2J2J2UUAUE2E2H2H2E 2E2 OSay lovely youth that dost my heart command | A |
Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand | A |
Must then her name the wretched writer prove | B |
To thy remembrance lost as to thy love | C |
Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose | D |
The Lute neglected and the Lyric muse | D |
Love taught my tears in adder notes to flow | E |
And tun'd my heart to Elegies of woe | E |
I burn I burn as when thro' ripen'd corn | F |
By driving winds the spreading flames are borne | F |
Phaon to Aetna's scorching fields retires | G |
While I consume with more than Aetna's fires | H |
No more my soul a charm in music finds | I |
Music has charms alone for peaceful minds | I |
Soft scenes of solitude no more can please | J |
Love enters there and I'm my own disease | J |
No more the Lesbian dames my passion move | B |
Once the dear objects of my guilty love | C |
All other loves are lost in only thine | K |
Ah youth ungrateful to a flame like mine | K |
Whom would not all those blooming charms surprize | J |
Those heav'nly looks and dear deluding eyes | J |
The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear | L |
A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear | M |
Would you with ivy wreath your flowing hair | L |
Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare | L |
Yet Phoebus lov'd and Bacchus felt the flame | N |
One Daphne warm'd and one the Cretan dame | N |
Nymphs that in verse no more could rival me | O |
That ev'n those Gods contend in charms with thee | O |
The Muses teach me all their softest lays | J |
And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise | J |
Tho' great Alcaeus more sublimely sings | J |
And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings | J |
No less renown attends the moving lyre | P |
Which Venus tunes and all her loves inspire | P |
To me what nature has in charms deny'd | A |
Is well by wit's more lasting flames supply'd | A |
Tho' short my stature yet my name extends | J |
To heav'n itself and earth's remotest ends | J |
Brown as I am an Ethiopian dame | N |
Inspir'd young Perseus with a gen'rous flame | N |
Turtles and doves of diff'ring hues unite | A |
And glossy jet is pair'd with shining white | A |
If to no charms thou wilt thy heart resign | K |
But such as merit such as equal thine | K |
By none alas by none thou canst be mov'd | A |
Phaon alone by Phaon must be lov'd | A |
Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ | Q |
Once in her arms you center'd all your joy | Q |
No time the dear remembrance can remove | B |
For oh how vast a memory has love | C |
My music then you could for ever hear | R |
And all my words were music to your ear | R |
You stopp'd with kisses my enchanting tongue | S |
And found my kisses sweeter than my song | T |
In all I pleas'd but most in what was best | A |
And the last joy was dearer than the rest | A |
Then with each word each glance each motion fir'd | A |
You still enjoy'd and yet you still desir'd | A |
'Till all dissolving in the trance we lay | U |
And in tumultuous raptures died away | U |
The fair Sicilians now thy soul inflame | N |
Why was I born ye Gods a Lesbian dame | N |
But ah beware Sicilian nymphs nor boast | A |
That wand'ring heart which I so lately lost | A |
Nor be with all those tempting words abus'd | A |
Those tempting words were all to Sappho us'd | A |
And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains | J |
Have pity Venus on your Poet's pains | J |
Shall fortune still in one sad tenor run | V |
And still increase the woes so soon begun | V |
Inur'd to sorrow from my tender years | J |
My parent's ashes drank my early tears | J |
My brother next neglecting wealth and fame | N |
Ignobly burn'd in a destructive flame | N |
An infant daughter late my griefs increas'd | A |
And all a mother's cares distract my breast | A |
Alas what more could fate itself impose | J |
But thee the last and greatest of my woes | J |
No more my robes in waving purple flow | E |
Nor on my hand the sparkling di'monds glow | E |
No more my locks in ringlets curl'd diffuse | J |
The costly sweetness of Arabian dews | J |
Nor braids of gold the varied tresses bind | A |
That fly disorder'd with the wanton wind | A |
For whom should Sappho use such arts as these | J |
He's gone whom only she desir'd to please | J |
Cupid's light darts my tender bosom move | B |
Still is there cause for Sappho still to love | C |
So from my birth the Sisters fix'd my doom | W |
And gave to Venus all my life to come | X |
Or while my Muse in melting notes complains | J |
My yielding heart keeps measure to my strains | J |
By charms like thine which all my soul have won | V |
Who might not ah who would not be undone | V |
For those Aurora Cephalus might scorn | F |
And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn | F |
For those might Cynthia lengthen Phaon's sleep | Y |
And bit Endymion nightly tend his sheep | Y |
Venus for those had rapt thee to the skies | J |
But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes | J |
O scarce a youth yet scarce a tender boy | Q |
O useful time for lovers to employ | Q |
Pride of thy age and glory of thy race | J |
Come to these arms and melt in this embrace | J |
The vows you never will return receive | Z |
And take at least the love you will not give | A2 |
See while I write my words are lost in tears | J |
The less my sense the more my love appears | J |
Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu | A |
At least to feign was never hard to you | A |
Farewell my Lesbian love you might have said | A |
Or coldly thus Farewell oh Lesbian maid | A |
No tear did you no parting kiss receive | Z |
Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve | Z |
No lover's gift your Sappho could confer | B2 |
And wrongs and woes were all you left with her | B2 |
No charge I gave you and no charge could give | A2 |
But this Be mindful of our loves and live | C2 |
Now by the Nine those pow'rs ador'd by me | O |
And Love the God that ever waits on thee | O |
When first I heard from whom I hardly knew | A |
That you were fled and all my joys with you | A |
Like some sad statue speechless pale I stood | A |
Grief chill'd my breast and stopp'd my freezing blood | A |
No sigh to rise no tear had powr to flow | E |
Fix'd in a stupid lethargy of woe | E |
But when its way th' impetuous passion found | A |
I rend my tresses and my breast I wound | A |
I rave then weep I curse and then complain | D2 |
Now swell to rage no melt in tears again | E2 |
Not fiercer pangs distract the mournful dame | N |
Whose first born infant feeds the fun'ral flame | N |
My scornful brother with a smile appears | J |
Insults my woes and triumphs in my tears | J |
His hated image ever haunts my eyes | J |
And why this grief thy daughter lives he cries | J |
Stung with my Love and furious with despair | L |
All torn my garments and my bosom bare | L |
My woes thy crimes I to the world proclaim | N |
Such inconsistent things are love and shame | N |
'Tis thou art all my care and my delight | A |
My daily longing and my dream by night | A |
Oh night more pleasing than the brightest day | U |
When fancy gives what absence takes away | U |
And dress'd in all its visionary charms | J |
Restores my fair deserter to my arms | J |
Then round your neck in wanton wreaths I twine | K |
Then you methinks as fondly circle mine | K |
A thousand tender words I hear and speak | F2 |
A thousand melting kisses give and take | G2 |
Then fiercer joys I blush to mention these | J |
Yet while I blush confess how much they please | J |
But when with day the sweet delusions fly | H2 |
And all things wake to life and joy but I | H2 |
As if once more forsaken I complain | D2 |
And close my eyes to dream of you again | E2 |
Then frantic rise and like some Fury rove | I2 |
Thro' lonely plains and thro' the silent grove | I2 |
As if the silent grove and lonely plains | J |
That knew my pleasures could relieve my pains | J |
I view the Grotto once the scene of love | C |
The rocks around the hanging roofs above | C |
That charm'd me more with native moss o'ergrown | E2 |
Than Phyrgian marble or the Parian stone | E2 |
I find the shades that veil'd our joys before | J2 |
But Phaon gone those shades delight no more | J2 |
Here the press'd herbs with bending tops betray | U |
Where oft entwin'd in am'rous folds we lay | U |
I kiss that earth which once was press'd by you | A |
And all with tears the with'ring herbs bedew | U |
For thee the fading trees appear to mourn | E2 |
And birds defer their songs till thy return | E2 |
Night shades the grove s and all in silence lie | H2 |
All but the mournful Philomel and I | H2 |
With mournful Philomel I join my strain | E2 |
Of Tereus she of Phaeon I complain | E2 |
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A spring there is whose si | O |
Alexander Pope
(1)
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