T. R. Smith, comp. Poetica Erotica: Rare and Curious Amatory Verse. 1921–22.
Sapphic Ode LIV: Adown the Lesbian vales
By Michael Field (Katherine Harris Bradley) (18461914)(From Long Ago, 1889) ADOWN the Lesbian vales, | |
When spring first flashes out, | |
I watch the lovely rout | |
Of maidens flitting ’mid the honey-bees | |
For thyme and heath, | 5 |
Cistus, and trails | |
Of myrtle-wreath: | |
They bring me these | |
My passionate, unsated sense to please. | |
In turn, to please my maids, | 10 |
Most deftly will I sing | |
Of their soft cherishing | |
In apple-orchards with cool waters by, | |
Where slumber streams | |
From quivering shades, | 15 |
And Cypris seems | |
To bend and sigh, | |
Her golden calyx offering amorously. | |
What praises would be best | |
Wherewith to crown my girls? | 20 |
The rose when she unfurls | |
Her balmy, lighted buds is not so good, | |
So fresh as they | |
When on my breast | |
They lean, and say | 25 |
All that they would, | |
Opening their glorious, candid maidenhood. | |
To that pure band alone | |
I sing of marriage-loves; | |
As Aphrodite’s doves | 30 |
Glance in the sun their colour comes and goes: | |
No girls let fall | |
Their maiden zone | |
At Hymen’s call | |
Serene as those | 35 |
Taught by a poet why sweet Hesper glows. | |