One of the most memorable episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is "Restless," which mainly consists of dream sequences. In one of these, two characters, Tara and Willow, talk while Willow paints Greek letters on Tara's naked back. The inscription must have been done hastily, because the initial letter in the eleventh line is actually calligraphed as a Latin "S" instead of a Greek "Sigma." For a long time, I wondered what the text was and doubted that it could be identified or reproduced. Happily, I learned that it is the poem "Immortal Aphrodite" by Sappho. While I am unable to present the text in actual Greek letters, I do offer below a transciption using Latin letters to represent the Greek text. While other websites (listed at the bottom of this page) can tell you more about this poem, no one else seems to have bothered to show how the calligraphy appears on Tara's back on television. I have done so here, complete with split words that begin at the end of one line and continue on the next. (Note that the only way of knowing how most lines end is to know how the next line begins, because the camera angle used in the television film shows us the left side of Tara's back far more clearly than the right.) While the words on Tara's back run together, I have put spaces between each word for the purpose of clarity, and I put a period at the end of the short line that ends the first stanza. I also finish the second stanza even though, in the television film, it is impossible to see whether the last line of the stanza has been completed or not. (If it is, the poem must continue on Tara's butt, which is not shown.)

POIKILO' THRON' ATHANA/

T' APHRODITA PAI DI/

OS DOLOPLOKA, L/

ISSOMAI SE ME M'/

ASAISI MED' ONIAI/

SI DAMNA POTNI/

A THUMON.

ALLA TUID' ELTH' AI/

POTA KATEROTA T/

AS EMAS AUDO/

S AIOISA PELOI/

EKLUES, PATROS DE DOMON LIPOISA CHRUSION ELTHES

And here is Diane Rayor's translation of the above portion of the poem:

On the throne of many hues, Immortal Aphrodite,

child of Zeus, weaving wiles--I beg you

not to subdue my spirit, Queen,

with pain or sorrow

but [ALLA] come--if ever before

having heard my voice from far away

you listened, and leaving your father's

golden home you came...

It is worth noting that Sappho was not a dry poet in the modern sense, but a song writer. Unfortunately, the music that went with these lyrics has been lost. So, too, have most of her lyrics been lost.

Links to other sites on the Web

A good intro to IMMORTAL APHRODITE
A site devoted to Tara featuring this poem
Another site that explains this poem's use by Tara and Willow