Sappho's Anactoria Poem (Fragment 16)

Today, we’re running a close-read on a poem that argues, flatly, that the most beautiful thing is whatever you love best. It makes that case by dragging in the most radioactive love story in the ancient world—Helen of Troy—and then swerving to a single absent person: Anactoria.

A note on form: most of Sappho survives in fragments—papyrus torn at the edges, lines missing, rescued quotations. What you’ll read is complete enough to argue with, incomplete enough to demand judgment. That’s the point here: attention and judgment are the antidotes to brainrot.

The Poem (commonly known as “Anactoria”)

Some say thronging cavalry, some say foot soldiers,
others call a fleet the most beautiful of
sights the dark earth offers, but I say it's what-
ever you love best.

And it's easy to make this understood by
everyone, for she who surpassed all human
kind in beauty, Helen, abandoning her
husband—that best of

men—went sailing off to the shores of Troy and
never spent a thought on her child or loving
parents: when the goddess seduced her wits and
left her to wander,

she forgot them all, she could not remember
anything but longing, and lightly straying
aside, lost her way. But that reminds me
now: Anactória,

she's not here, and I'd rather see her lovely
step, her sparkling glance and her face than gaze on
all the troops in Lydia in their chariots and
glittering armor.