Sappho (25 page)

The candle-dipping area was announced first to the nose by the perfumed tallow. The tapers themselves were piled in great mounds, for Sappho had ever been a lover of light.

“I will take you now to the stables,” she said, “so you may see how the horses are kept.”

But Kleis had opened a side door and peered in. A slave wearing only a loincloth sat at work upon the floor. His body gleamed with sweat as he hammered with a covered wooden mallet what appeared to be a large white mat.

Sappho had not intended that the papyrus maker be part of the tour. This was an encroachment on her private life, which was shared with no one.

“What is he doing?” Kleis asked. “And what are those plants growing from pots?”

Since it had been discovered, Sappho shrugged and explained. “The plants are papyrus, from Egypt. And very difficult it was to bring them such a distance. Being water plants, they had to be kept damp. This when the sailors themselves had no drinking water. Needless to say, the plants arrived in poor condition. Most died, but the few you see here were nurtured and brought to health.”

“What is done with them?” Kleis asked.

Erinna had already guessed.

Sappho continued: “A most wonderful material is made from the pulp of their stalks. See that fibrous white stuff he pounds? Now look on this workbench, where at a later stage it lies smoothed. Its own gluelike sap cements these long strips, which the papyrus maker has cut. Other strips are then placed over them in a crosshatch such as you see drying. Eventually they are pressed into a sheet. Many sheets pasted together comprise a roll, which is what I write my poems on.”

“You write them down!” Damophyla exclaimed.

“Yes, I preserve them. This slave was purchased for his ability, when I was yet in Syracuse. The amulet upon his chest is called the Papyrus Column, for it is in the form of this wonderful stalk, and its power makes his fingers nimble.”

*   *   *

The hour was late. In dream, Damophyla roused her. But it was no dream. The girl had again slipped into her bed.

She leaned over her. “O Sappho, lady of my heart. I felt your glances today and I knew—”

“What did you know?” Sappho whispered.

“Your hunger.” The return whisper was accompanied with a tongue-kiss. “I want to sleep with you this night in love. And if I can, to please you. Lie back, O Sappho of strange beauty and banked fire, and I will teach how we approach one another in Asia Minor. First, we anoint the skin.” The girl drew out her vials, which she had secreted under the pillows, and began rubbing Sappho's limbs.

Sappho closed her eyes and gave herself to yearning. At last the swelling engorgement of her flesh caused her to pull the girl close. They discovered each other. Damophyla handled her aggressively, as Erinna never dared. Voluptuously Sappho arched her small body. The hands of love spanned it like a bridge. And something exploded—she herself.

The girl lifted her to her knees, for Sappho was light and fragile. On her knees she had given birth, and on her knees she had Damophyla. Unlike Erinna, who was too soon exhausted, Damophyla continued her assault on Sappho as she swayed insatiably in her arms.

Sappho's lidded eyes only seemed closed; she watched all that the girl did. How skillful she was in the arts of love, yet hardly more than a child, sixteen or seventeen, she guessed. Sixteen, she decided, as the girl rotated her on her lap, examining her as she would a toy. Knowing fingers caused the rush of anguish that precedes release.

When they were able to lie quietly side by side, Sappho asked, “Was it Eros gave you such skill?”

Damophyla laughed. “No. Practice.”

“You are so young,” Sappho protested.

“I earned my dowry in the sacred grounds of the temple. One learns quickly how to win the last drachma from a purse.”

“I know the custom,” Sappho said. She moved away in her mind, composing, but the girl did not know it.

Damophyla went on, “Men have done such things to me as we did, and more because of the way they are made—and less, because they do not know what drives a woman mad. Sometimes it is to hold without motion and let sensation reign until the last contraction.

“How small your feet are, Sappho, how perfect your toes. How elegant and dainty your hands. I cannot breathe; I think I will die,” she ended because Sappho was again with her.

When she was able, Damophyla continued, “I have my dower, and all is ready for my marriage, but I want to stay with you. Say that I may. I wish it with my heart.”

There was a cry, cut off, suppressed. Someone had lifted the silver latch. Someone had stood at the door of the chamber.

Seeing her lover so startled, Damophyla said, “It was the sound of a bird, a night sound.” And she began once more to kiss her breasts. But Sappho had turned pale. She took Damophyla's hands and stopped them.

“So it was the other one,” Damophyla said, “the top-heavy one. What of it?”

“I think Eros sent me trouble when he sent me you. Stand up.”

“Why?”

“Do it.”

Damophyla rose and Sappho also got to her feet. Hunting around she found the girl's chiton of many colors and tossed it to her. “Put it on,” Sappho ordered as she, more carefully, dressed herself.

“Why?” Damophyla asked.

“You shall see.”

The girl threw herself upon the floor. “Do not send me away,” and in suppliant but sinuous ascent began to work her fingers up Sappho's leg to the division of her body. But her wiles could not deflect Sappho. She yanked her to her feet and marched rather than walked her through the house, into the courtyard, and to Erinna's bungalow.

Sappho did not call out for permission to enter, nor did she scratch at the door, but flung it wide. Erinna was crouched in a corner of the bed. She regarded them with mournful, questioning eyes.

Sappho, giving a dextrous flick of her wrist, threw the much larger girl between them.

Damophyla looked uncertainly from one to the other.

“She is here,” Sappho said. “I have brought her to you.”

“To me?” Erinna's voice was a harsh whisper.

“Are we not friend-lovers? Do we not share all things? I had her. Now she is yours.”

“No!” Damophyla shrieked. “I am a guest-friend; I am not to be handed about.”

“You handed yourself about in the sacred grove,” Sappho snapped.

“That was different, honorable. It was for my dowry. I came to you through love. I loved your songs when I was a child, when I was grown I came to you as to a goddess. Then I saw how things were with you, I thought I too…”

“Could play Sappho's games? Oh no. Only I say who is to play.”

“You yielded to her,” Erinna said in reproach.

“Yes. The gods have made me weak when my own kind are near.”

“Weak? And for your weakness I am to be a jest, a prostitute?” Damophyla cried.

“For your audacity,” Sappho replied.

Erinna interrupted mildly. “Will neither of you ask or consider me?”

Sappho looked at her friend in surprise.

“I want none who come unwillingly,” Erinna said. “I am happy in your love, Sappho, Lady of Art. I apologize for my tears and my jealousy. I do not wish my love to place bounds on you; I have no wish to fetter your pleasure.”

Sappho's look was hard and discerning, then it softened. “You are a rare gem, my Erinna. Let us sit with you and have a glass of Lesbian wine, that which my brother cultivates in his vineyards. Will you pour, Damophyla?”

The girl did as she was asked, handing the first cup to Sappho, who gave it to Erinna. “And where is yours?” Sappho asked Damophyla.

The girl began to cry. “You both hate me. I am odious to you and to myself.”

“What nonsense. Some god has surely run away with your wits. No thing of beauty is odious or hateful to me. I loved your love. There is no reason to deny it, since Erinna saw. But Erinna”—she turned to her friend—“the girl is a gift, full of delights. Can we not, as friend-lovers, all three lie upon your couch? My husband, Kerkolas, told me many times that he and his friends did this both with boys and girls. He did not ask me to join him in such games, as he knew my heart was not toward him. Come, we three will compare the beauty that together Aphrodite has given us. And I will praise her and you in a wonderful song that is already in my mind. Come, lie with me. Disrobe if you wish, I shall.”

And she, childlike in her nakedness, climbed upon Erinna's bed. “What do your feelings tell you, Erinna? Does this sharing not seem to you a good and a pretty thing? And you, Damophyla, look with tenderness and wonder on Erinna's breasts. One can bury one's face there as in one's mother. And observe the extreme slenderness of her body, like a delicate reed. Spread balm upon her, feel with your fingers the coolness of her flesh. Allow it, Erinna, for her fingers knead all tension from you and leave you powerless to overcome the ardor of her caress.”

And so, coaxing, Sappho induced both girls to her, one to either side, and both reluctant.

Quick as a sacred Egyptian cat, she extricated herself from the center and tumbled them together. She had them laughing now, and with both heads upon her lap, gently stroked each, dipping her hands into Erinna's alabaster jars for tinted oriental oils and delicate creams.

Erinna leaned over Damophyla to lay the scent of ambergris behind Sappho's ears, then with the smallest hesitation performed the same service for Damophyla. Damophyla was intoxicated with the way Erinna's breasts swung against her. She touched and then suckled. Erinna, smiling at the girl's adolescent sucking, caressed her.

Sappho stayed still, fascinated as passion swept over them like lava flowing hot from a crack. The girls wound around each other, legs entwined; Sappho felt her own blood surge as their four arms lifted her, head and breasts hanging. Damophyla held her pelvis, Erinna her shoulders, and Sappho swung in air as Erinna's passionate tongue felt out her lips and mouth. Damophyla took possession of the long scarlet opening, and Sappho cried in frenzy. Inside the skin of her secret recesses the fingers of her lovers almost touched. Sappho knew she had been born for this ultimate voluptuous moment. Their heightened sensual play lasted until light stole under the door.

The girls carried her to the spring, where they floated her indolently, murmuring gently. She clung first to Erinna, then Damophyla. They were no longer rivals, but one in passion and in love. And Sappho made sacrifice of a garlanded lamb.

*   *   *

It was typical of Mitylene society to hold back, judge the success of Sappho's endeavor, before entrusting their own daughters to her tutelage. It took the arrival of Euneika from Salamis, near Athens, and Anaktoria from Miletus, and especially Gorgo of royal lineage to convince the first families of Mitylene. They no longer hesitated and a group of young women from Lesbos itself appeared at her door: Kydro, Atthis, Dika, Megara, and Telesippa.

Letters sent a year before also brought dainty Timas from Phokaea to the House of the Servants of the Muses. She was tiny like Sappho, but with a merry nature. The others treated her as their doll, cajoled her from her lessons, petted her, and fed her sweets.

Hero, a supple little maiden, arrived from Gyara, near Andros. Her family had known Kerkolas. She informed Sappho that her husband's relatives were incensed at her taking the treasure in the counting house, all the stores, and what ships and men were in Syracuse harbor.

Sappho shrugged. “I left the villa. I could not think how to get it onto the ships!”

Their laughter formed a light but friendly bond.

With such an influx, Sappho had each girl stand forth and tell of her home, and what was the state of art there, and philosophy, and the status of women. “For know,” Sappho lectured them, “that Athene was born from the head of Father Zeus. Therefore, she is all intellect. And the gods in their councils listen to her words.

“When I was young,” she went on, “I was rash enough to think because women kept Mitylene and ministered to the people and their problems during the ten-year war, that they should continue to do so. But two exiles taught me that only at times may we succeed in softening the laws that not only strip women of property but make them property themselves. And toward this end the House of the Servants of the Muses will fit you.” It was a heavy promise, and she felt her responsibility.

From the outset Sappho decided the “initiate” alone could know her favors. The rest knew her as teacher, as patron, and did not suspect Love was the god she and her small inner group worshipped. For was it not in the act of uniting with another that the gateway opened to that elemental force which created the gods themselves and all Nature and whatever worlds filled the void? In that implosion one is lifted out of self and joins the All, the great mystery. And she understood Damophyla's temple prostitution. It is at such moments one reaches the ultimate and becomes it.

From among the newcomers she chose little Timas for their intimate romps and frolics. To love her three friends was natural to Timas; her innocence was genuine, and it was her delight to give pleasure in new ways.

Timas danced naked on a net arranged over their bed. The dance ended when they caught her little feet and pulled them through widely separated holes. In this position their snared bird was tickled, fondled, and caressed. Next they made a swing for her in the walled garden, and not once did she swing alone or with clothes on. She had not known play could be so exciting. Sappho she adored as a goddess, squeezing in next to her when the time for learning songs came. But she loved them all and was so winning and of such a happy nature that they spoiled her outrageously.

“What a child you are,” Sappho murmured, as, like the yellow kitten, Timas curled against her.

*   *   *

During the second year of her academy, Sappho's hetaerae performed at the Mystery of Dionysos. She had them learn new songs while she pounded out the meter with a stave. Erinna's verse was sung with her own, and the girl's name became known.