Phaon
Bird-throated child of Lesbos, let us turn
To those dark hills of home and Long Ago
That one great love relumes, and one lost voice
Still like a fading lute with sorrow haunts.
Sappho
Dear hills of sun and gloom and green—soft hills
Ambrosial I shall see no more!
Phaon
Ambrosial I shall see no more! Nay, come,
O Violet-Crowned, come back where still the girls
Laugh ruddy-ankled round the Lesbian vats
And swart throats from the laden galleys sing
At eve of love and women as of old—
Sappho
How far away those twilight voices are!
Phaon
And down the solemn Dorian scale the pipes
Wander and plead, then note by note awake
Shrill with Aeolian gladness once again.
Come back where opiate lyres shall drowse away
This wordless hunger that has paled your face,
Where island hills reach out their arms for you;
Come back, and be at rest!
Sappho (turning to him)
Come back, and be at rest! O island home
Where we were happy once!
Phaon
Where we were happy once! And shall again
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