one of my favorite things about sappho 31 (the “he seems equal to the gods” poem) is how sappho describes herself as paler than grass when she looks at the girl she has a crush on like. the imagery of that stanza in general is beautiful and i love the idea of thin fire racing under her skin, but i really love what sappho does with her word usage for this particular phrase. the word she uses for “paler” is χλωροτέρα, which refers in general to a sort of pale-green color (it’s where we get “chlorophyll” from). but χλωρός also has a more specific connotation in homer- it is the color of fear, the color that a soldier turns when he realizes that he’s about to die. sappho uses a word that has an undertone of death to it, and immediately follows it up with talking about how she seems to herself to be little short of dying
so basically, this part of the poem is sappho rolling around on her bed doing the ancient greek equivalent “ugh she’s so CUTE and i like her so MUCH i’m literally going to DIE” and that’s quite frankly one of the most relatable things i’ve ever seen
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