ANACREON
Anacreon of Teos, although an Ionian by birth, is generally reckoned with Alcaeus and Sappho among the Aeolians, because he "cultivated the lyrical stanza of personal emotion." His Ionian temperament, however, influences his verses to such an extent that they lose the intensity and sincerity of those of Alcaeus and Sappho, although they keep the grace and delicacy of style of these earlier poets.
Anacreon was essentially a court poet, although it was at a different court from time to time that he made his home,—first under the patronage of Polycrates in Samos, then with Hipparchus at Athens. He died probably at the court of a Thessalian prince at the end of the sixth century b. c. His songs rarely touched on themes more serious than love and wine, and make it hard to find the man behind the poet. The wide popularity of his verses incited many to imitate them, and most of the writings which have come down to us under his name are "Anacreontics," works of authors of unknown later periods.
The translations that follow are all from the Anacreontics, made by Thomas Moore.
ANACREONTICS
OLD AGE. ODE VII.
The women tell me every day
That all my bloom has past away.
"Behold," the pretty wantons cry,
