The portrait of the poet Sappho

The portrait of the poet Sappho with her violet tiara, acrylic on canvas painting

Sappho and the girl who had to leave the isle of Lesbos

Sappho and one of her muses, in the sad moment when the girl had to leave against her will, acrylics on canvas painting.
The poem below has inspired me

I have had not one word from her

Frankly I wish I were dead.
When she left, she wept

a great deal; she said to
me, ``This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly.''

I said, ``Go, and be happy
but remember (you know
well) whom you leave shackled by love

``If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodite
and all the loveliness that we shared

``all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck

``myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them

``while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song...''

Sappho

Me and Sappho

Watching my painting about Sappho and the girl who had to leave her and the island of Lesbos I wish it was me next to this Sappho

The poet Sappho, the Pleiades and the moon

The poet Sappho, the Pleiades and the moon, oil on canvas painting

The moon has set 

And the Pleiades; 

It is midnight, 

The time is going by, 

 And I sleep alone. 

This is Sappho's midnight poem. This poem has inspired me to make the painting above, a painting of a lonely Sappho watching the Pleiades and the moon while they set at midnight.

Recently the UTA researchers have dated this poem between January 25 and March 31.
Sappho has written this poem feeling lonely, as lonely as I feel, that feeling of loneliness that we all have when we cannot be with the one we love or we want to love.

Sappho, the Pleiades and the moon

This is my ballpoint pen drawing of a sad and lonely Sappho watching the moon and the Pleiades.
The poem below, one of her creations, has inspired me

The moon has set, 
And the Pleiades; 
It is midnight, 
The time is going by, 
And I sleep alone.

Sappho's girl-garden

This is my painting of Eranna Gyrinna Gyara and Gorgo, the young girls Sappho has written the poem below for.

This is my song of maidens dear to me.
Eranna, a slight girl I counted thee,
When first I looked upon thy form and face,
Slim as a reed, and all devoid of grace.
But stately stature, grace and beauty came
Unto thee with the years — O, dost not shame
For this, Eranna, that thy pride hath grown
Therewith? Alas for thee ! I have not known
One beauty ever of more scornful mien,
As though thou wert of all earth's daughters queen!
Mnasidica is comelier, perchance,
Than my Gyrinna — ah, but sweetly rings
Gyrinna's matchless voice ! In rapture-trance
I listen, listen, while Gyrinna sings.
Hero of Gyara is fleet of foot
As fawns, and as light-footed in the dance,
The dance taught by the measures of my lute.
Ever-impassioned Gorgo! — is it strange
That I grow weary of the change on change
Of thine adored ones? — of thy rhapsodies
O'er each new girlfriend, while the old love dies?
Joy to thee, daughter of a princely race,
For thy last dear one! Lie in her embrace —
Till shines a new star on thy raptured eyes!
Fonder of maids thou art, I trow, than she.
The ghost who nightly steal young girls, to be
In Hades of her woeful company.
This is my fair girl-garden: sweet they grow —
Rose, violet, asphodel and lily's snow;
And which the sweetest is, I do not know;
For rosy arms and starry eyes are there.
Honey-sweet voices and cheeks passing fair.
And these shall men, I ween, remember long;
For these shall bloom for ever in my song. 

Sappho and Gongyla

Looking at my painting I wish I was Gongyla

The portrait of Sappho's muse

The poem below, written by Sappho, has inspired me to make this painting. This is how I imagine the girl Sappho has written the poem for, the girl who has to leave the island of Lesbos, wearing a violet tiara and a necklace made of rosebuds dill and crocus.
It's a sad poem about a girl who had to leave Sappho and the isle of Lesbos against her will and against her feelings. It's poem abot tears, infinite sadness and love that is to weak to survive in a hostile world. Even if she loved Sappho, this girls had to leave her be cause she was forced to. There were long periods in history when women had no right to decide about their own lifes and could not follow their feelings.

I have not had one word from her

Frankly I wish I were dead
When she left, she wept
a great deal; she said to me, "This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly."

I said, "Go, and be happy
but remember (you know
well) whom you leave shackled by love

"If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodite
and all the loveliness that we shared

"all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck

"myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them

"while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song..

My drawings and paintings of the poet Sappho and some words about the censorship of her poems

Sappho and Gongyla, acrylics on canvas painting

These are mai painting of the poet Sappho from the Isle of Lesbos. I don't know if she was really homosexual but she was a great poet, a feminist and a sensitive artist. She loved beauty in all of it's forms, the beauty of nature, flowers and young girls. Unfortunately most of her creations have been destroyed by the misogyny christians that followed her. This christians, especially the orthodox christians in the eastern europe, acted and keep acting like talibans.

Sappho's poems were not about pornography and perversions. Sappho's poems were just about feminity, beauty and pure love, but they were destroyed be cause they have been written by a woman and this would contradict the text written by Saul (known as Saint Paul), a frustrated gay man in denial who hated gay men and all women be cause he could not accept himself. This Saul wrote that women are inferior and should not be allowed to be leaders of opinion, write and teach others. 

Even the muslims were influenced by this frustrated man, islam being a branch that emerged later from the common stem of the abrahamic religions. All the abrahamic religions are characterised by misogynism and a conservative and intolerant attitude and have pulled humanity and civilisation backwards.

As I said before it's a pity a lot of creations, including Sappho's poems, have been lost because christians have destroyed them, like they did with Alexandria library. 

Abrahamic religions have always been the worst enemy of both arts and science and without them we would have been far in space, reaching distant planets, without them.

There were times when people were killed be cause the had the courage to say the Earth is just a sphere rotating around the sun. 

Scientists were killed, artworks were destroyed and wars were made in the name of a religion that claims to be the religion of love, peace and wisdom. 

How can you talk abot love while you promote hate and intolerance? How can you talk about wisdom while you burn books and kill people just be cause they dare to tell the scientific truth contradicting the bible? Hou can you talk about peace while you make war "in the name of God"?

I's sad there are so many places in this world were people still follow abrahamic doctrine instead of knowing the scientific truth.

Sappho's rose, oil on canvas painting

F Zeus chose us a King of the flowers in his mirth,

He would call to the rose, and would royally crown it;

For the rose, ho, the rose! is the grace of the earth,

Is the light of the plants that are growing upon it!

For the rose, ho, the rose! is the eye of the flowers,

Is the blush of the meadows that feel themselves fair,

Is the lightning of beauty that strikes through the bowers

On pale lovers that sit in the glow unaware.

Ho, the rose breathes of love! ho, the rose lifts the cup

To the red lips of Cypris invoked for a guest!

Ho, the rose having curled its sweet leaves for the world

Takes delight in the motion its petals keep up,

As they laugh to the wind as it laughs from the west.

This poem Sappho has wrote about the rose, the king of the flowers as she said has inspired me to make the oil on canvas painting above and the drawing below.

This is how I imagine Sappho, a beautiful woman with white soft skin and long dark hair, holding a rose in her hand, being inspired by the delicate beauty of the flower, an image of grace, beauty and femininity.

The poet Sappho

As I said in my older posts Sappho was a feminist. She has teached young girls to be feminine and love their femininity. Sappho loved art and beauty in all of it's forms, the beauty of flowers, stars and young girls, the beauty that was inspiring her. Unfortunately most of her poems have been destroyed by the byzantine misogynist  christians.
This is my oil on canvas painting of the poet Sappho next to Gongyla, one of her muses, the girl she wrote the poem below for.

Come back to me, Gongyla, here tonight,
You, my rose, with your Lydian lyre.
There hovers forever around you delight:
A beauty desired.

Even your garment plunders my eyes.
I am enchanted: I who once
Complained to the Cyprus-born goddess,
Whom I now beseech

Never to let this lose me grace
But rather bring you back to me:
Amongst all mortal women the one
I most wish to see.

Sappho's rose

One of Sappho's poems has inspired me to make this drawing of a beautiful woman with a rose that makes her look more feminine a and beautiful. Looking at this drawing I can almost feel the perfume of the rose, her perfume and I wish I could touch and kiss her red rose lips and hersmooth white skin.
This is the poem.

If it pleased the whim of Zeus in an idle
Hour to choose a king for the flowers, he surely
Would have crowned the rose for its regal beauty,
                        Deeming it peerless;

By its grace is valley and hill embellished,
Earth is made a shrine for the lover's ardor;
Dear it is to flowers as the charm of lovely
                        Eyes are to mortals;

Joy and pride of plants, and the garden's glory,
Beauty's blush it brings to the cheek of meadows;
Draining fire and dew from the dawn for rarest
                        Color and odor;

Softly breathed, its scent is a plea for passion,
When it blooms to welcome the kiss of Kypris;
Sheathed in fragrant leaves its tremulous petals
                        Laugh in the zephyr.

The portrait of the poet Sappho

Sappho and Gongyla

This is my balpoint pen drawing of the poet Sappho and Gongyla, one of her girlfriends.
I have a tempera painting too.

This is the poem Sappho wrote for Gongyla, the poem that inspired me.
Please

Come back to me, Gongyla, here tonight,
You, my rose, with your Lydian lyre.
There hovers forever around you delight:
A beauty desired.

Even your garment plunders my eyes.
I am enchanted: I who once
Complained to the Cyprus-born goddess,
Whom I now beseech

Never to let this lose me grace
But rather bring you back to me:
Amongst all mortal women the one
I most wish to see.

Sappho and the girl with the violet tiara, the muse of the poem “No word”

This is my pencil drawing of Sappho and the girls she wrote the poem “No word” for, a very sad poem about a girl who has to leave the island and Sappho unwillingly This is what happened to many women in the past. They were forced to marry men who they didn’t love and leave the true love behind. Their life was so painful and sad be cause they didn’t have the freedom and the right to choose the person to spend their life with. This happened in Romania too in the past. There is a waterfall in our country where a young bride committed suicide be cause she had to marry a man she didn’t love and there was nothing she could do.

This is the poem I am talking about

 

I have had not one word from her
Frankly I wish I were dead.
When she left, she wept
a great deal; she said to
me, ``This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly.''
I said, ``Go, and be happy
but remember (you know
well) whom you leave shackled by love
``If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodite
and all the loveliness that we shared
``all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck
``myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them
``while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song...''

Sappho, coffee painting

This is my painting of Sappho and one of the girls who came to the isle of Lesbos to study poetry and arts. I've made this painting using only Lavazza coffee and sugar.

Sappho, pencil drawing

This is my pencil drawing of the poet Sappho and one of the girls on the Isle of Lesbos

New drawing of Sappho and Gongyla

This is my newest pen drawing of the poet Sappho and Gongyla, one of her girlfriends.
This is the poem Sappho wrote for Gongyla, the poem that inspired me.

Please

Come back to me, Gongyla, here tonight,
You, my rose, with your Lydian lyre.
There hovers forever around you delight:
A beauty desired.
Even your garment plunders my eyes.
I am enchanted: I who once
Complained to the Cyprus-born goddess,
Whom I now beseech
Never to let this lose me grace
But rather bring you back to me:
Amongst all mortal women the one
I most wish to see.

Sappho and the girl who left the island

This is my pen drawing of Sappho and one of the young girls who had to leave the island, a drawing inspired from Sappho’s poem No word.

Sappho – No word

I have had not one word from her
Frankly I wish I were dead.
When she left, she wept
a great deal; she said to
me, ``This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly.''
I said, ``Go, and be happy
but remember (you know
well) whom you leave shackled by love
``If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodite
and all the loveliness that we shared
``all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck
``myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them
``while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song...''
Sappho

New oil painting of Sappho

These is my newest oil painting representing the great poet of love and beauty Sappho, the female poet in the ancient Greece who wrote about the beauty of the young maidens, the feminine delicate beauty, so pure, so innocent, so wonderful. Sappho was a feminist, a poet who wrote about women and for women.