Fragment from Sappho for National Poetry Month

If a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, why do I always want the other bird?  By which I mean to say that I really do have poems picked out for April - did you know it's National Poetry Month again already? - but I saw this over on lemorttoussaint's site and couldn't resist...

And for kerkevik, the same journal has a Leonard Cohen poem.

Fragment from Sappho (trans. Anne Carson)

He seems to me equal to gods that man

whoever he is who opposite you

sits and listens close

to your sweet speaking

 

and lovely laughing--oh it

puts the heart in my chest on wings

for when I look at you, even a moment, no speaking

is left in me

 

no:  tongue breaks and thin

fire is racing under skin

and in eyes no sight and drumming

fills ears

 

and cold sweat holds me and shaking

grips me all, greener than grass

I am and dead--or almost

I seem to me.