Oh! canst thou bear to see this faded frame
Deformed and mangled by the rocky deep?
Wilt thou remember, and forbear to weep,
My fatal fondness and my peerless fame?
Soon o'er this heart, now warm with passion's flame,
The howling winds and foamy waves shall sweep—
These eyes be ever closed in death's cold sleep,
And all of Sappho perish, but her name!
Yet, if the Fates suspend their barbarous ire,
If days less mournful, Heaven designs for me,
If rocks grow kind, and winds and waves conspire
To bear me softly on the swelling sea—
To Phoebus only will I tune my lyre,
‘What suits with Sappho, Phoebus, suits with thee!’