Editing Ibycus (section)

===Fragment 286===
The following poem was quoted by the ancient scholar Athenaeus in his wide-ranging discourses [[Deipnosophistae|''Scholars at Dinner'']] and it demonstrates some of the characteristics of Ibycean verse:
:::In spring the [[Kydonia]]n
:::apple trees, watered by flowing
:::streams there where the [[Nymphs|Maidens]]
:::have their unravished garden, and vine buds,
:::growing under the shadowy branches
:::of the vines, bloom and flourish. For me, however, love
:::is at rest in no season
:::but like the [[Thrace|Thracian]] [[Etesian|north wind]],
:::ablaze with lightning,
:::rushing from [[Aphrodite]] with scorching
:::fits of madness, dark and unrestrained,
:::it forcibly convulses from their very roots
:::my mind and heart.<ref>Andrew M.Miller (translator), ''Greek Lyric: an anthology in translation'', Hackett Publishing Company Inc. (1996), page 97</ref>
The poem establishes a contrast between the tranquility of nature and the ever restless impulses to which the poet's desires subject him, while the images and epithets accumulate almost chaotically, communicating a sense of his inner turmoil. In the original Greek, initial tranquility is communicated by repeated vowel sounds in the first six lines.<ref>D.A.Campbell, 'Monody', P.Easterling and B.Knox (ed.s), ''The Cambridge History of Classical Literature: Greek Literature'', Cambridge University Press (1985), page 215</ref> His love of nature and his ability to describe it in lively images are reminiscent of Sappho's work.<ref>C.M.Bowra, ''Greek Lyric Poetry from Alcman to Simonides'', Oxford University Press (1961, reprint 2000), page 265</ref>