Untitled Lyric Fragment by Sappho
[Text of the poem fragment in the original Greek]
[Translation by Anne Carson]
105A
as the sweetapple reddens on a high branch
high on the highest branch and the applepickers forgot—
no, not forgot: were unable to reach
105B
like the hyacinth in the mountains that shepherd men
with their feet trample down and on the ground the purple
flower
Source of the text in Greek and in translation – Anne Carson, If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002, pages 214-215.
TJB: Two hendecasyllabic wedding-similes: a beloved as the highest, unpickable/sweetest apple; & a beloved, a trampled flower/loved too much by Apollo.
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