Sappho’s Lament
I tarry mournful by the sea,
The vast Aegean Strait,
The blackness overwhelming me,
A devastating hate!
A jealousy abysmal dark,
A lover’s bitter rift,
And now the breakers hitting stark,
As angered heavens shift.
The overwhelming moodiness,
A mirror of demise,
An enervating wilderness,
Of vacillating skies.
The cyprus tower dark above,
In monumental poise,
Sentinels of stricken love,
Aside the rushing noise.
My lover has a prideful bent!
An overweening way!
Her willfulness from Hades sent!
Dost generate dismay!
A tongue devising hatefulness!
A panoply of jibes!
The ending of my gratefulness!
Such malice she describes!
I fly away dejectedly,
Surveilling all the strand,
So maudlin unexpectedly,
To melancholy fanned.
The limestone for a confidante,
The rock a steady ear,
My sulkiness preponderant,
At vistas spread austere.
An underlying spitefulness!
A poison in her speech!
The danger of her sweet caress,
Dost scepticism teach!
I walk towards the rocky shore,
And summon forth a scream,
So guttural and vicious raw,
To purge the fetid dream.
Released unto the raging main,
The pain prodigious rank,
So devastating, nigh insane!
A banshee on the bank!
I stare into the heaving wind,
The spray upon my hair,
By love again I stand chagrined,
The stairway to despair!
I keep my centre still as stone,
The place where solace hides,
My hallowed mantras to intone,
So joy again abides.
I stand upon the ageless crest,
And breathe away the guile,
By elements of air impressed,
I see again a smile…
🌊
