Lyric Poem Fragment 31

People have tried to describe love in many different ways throughout history. Thousands of years ago Sappho wrote many love poems to express the impression of falling in love. Her lyric poem fragment 31 is a specific example that presents the inconsistent and complex emotions of lovers. In this fragment, when the speaker discovers that her loved one was chatting with an unknown man, she develops mixed feelings toward the man and wonders about her own encounter with her loved one. The honesty and intimacy of the text encourages the audience to empathize with what love means to the lover. This lyric poem effectively presents the irresistible power of love and the compelling effect of this affection that makes lovers experience emotional and physical …show more content…
Frist of all, it is illogical for one to use the man as a principal subject of the whole poem and praise him as a god yet not name the god-like person throughout the poem. The man is placed on the primary position, only to be given an impression of the significance of the beloved girl. The second line “whoever he is who opposite you” exposes the real intention of the singer that the man serves as a tool to emphasize the actually dominant character of the love poem, who is her lover. The pronoun “whoever” that the speaker assigned to the man reveals the insignificance of that man himself. What really matters, in the eyes of the speaker, is that the man is “opposite” and “sits and listens close” to “you”. The anonymous man is signified by the close distance and communication between the beloved and him. And because of the fact that the man could closely stay with the beloved, the power of love indirectly shapes an unimportant man into a god in the lover’s view. The anonymous man is less a god-like character than a necessary divine representation to emphasize the extensive power of love that even people close to the beloved turn to be great and supreme in the view of the