June 2nd, 1816

I’ve nearly finished my Hag of Beara poem.  I should say poems—I’ve gotten quite ambitious with it and it’s really more of a set now.  They still need work, of course, but I think that they’re coming along quite nicely.

I was excited to show them to Frederick.  Anxious too, because I’ve never shown him an unfinished poem of mine before.  I suppose that that’s part of my ill-fated effort to preserve my mystique as an artist.  But I really shouldn’t have any secrets from Frederick.  It feels foolish to even try.

After I gave him the draft, he sat reading it for what felt like forever.  To be fair, the set is inordinately long.  I waited anxiously, and rather impatiently.  Once he was finished, he looked up, and I was alarmed to see a look of displeasure written across his face.  I asked what the matter was, terrified that he didn’t think they were any good.  Some silly part of me, I’m ashamed to say, was seized by the fear that he would leave me for being a poor poet.

He assured me that they were good, quite good, and my fears were momentarily allayed.  However, what Frederick said next brought all those fears back tenfold.  He said that, while good, the poems troubled him.

I can’t pretend that I didn’t consider this reaction to be a possibility.  The Hag of Beara poems are about sorrow and loss.  Naturally, I had to draw from my own well of those concepts.  I suppose that at times I imagined myself as the Hag of Beara.  Like I told Jenny, I understand her too well.

One of the poems was probably too much.  It was the one that, after some prodding, I discovered troubled Frederick the most.  It was about the Hag’s contemplations of death— inarguably a large theme in the story.  I couldn’t very well leave it out.  But I think it bothered Frederick that they were contemplations of her own death.  I should have been more careful of how this would be perceived, given my own history.

Frederick told me that he didn’t think it was good for me to dwell on stories like this one.  But happier ones, the ones he would have me read and reproduce, just can’t please me; it’s the strange and sorrowful that draws me like a moth to a flame.  I didn’t tell Frederick this.  I just agreed with him. 

But I did ask if he thought the poems might be good enough to publish.  I’ve never published any of my work before.  It’s not terribly uncommon for young ladies to do so, but I’ve spent too many years occupied with my mental state to be concerned about much else.

Frederick looked down, hesitant to answer.  Then he was quite adamant when he told me no.  He said it was a poor idea.  No one was going to publish them anyway, not when they were written by a melancholic woman.  And the subject material, he said, wasn’t right either.  People in England don’t care about old Irish stories.  He called them primitive and foolish.  They only interest old women and little girls.  I know that all sounds cruel, but he really said it quite gently.  He held my hand and looked into my eyes.

Tentatively, I asked if I might use a nom de plume, but he held his position.  Most likely, he wants my sole focus to be on recovery.  And our marriage, of course, which will certainly disrupt everything else in our lives.  I don’t know why I even suggested it.  It was a stupid idea.

Frederick has always cared for me like that.  I imagine that it’s why I first fell in love with him.  Lord knows why he fell in love with me. 

I never had someone there who cared enough to guide me, who truly had my best interests at heart.  My mother tried, I know, but she had enough trouble knowing what was best for her.  And my father never really knew at all.

With that being said, though, I’m not sure if Frederick was right in saying no one would want to read the poems of a mad woman.  On the contrary, I think they could be bestsellers from that alone.  It would certainly be nice to find some use for my melancholy, for a change.  Men do it all the time, but it’s different for them.  Men are brooding; women are mad.  Not that anyone would pay much mind to that observation coming from me.

The thought is cruel, and certainly foolish, but I can’t help but wonder if Frederick was worried I would succeed, and that I wouldn’t need him any longer.  After all, I constantly worry that he won’t need me any longer.  More likely he believed that I would fail.  Neither of these options reflects very well on him, though, so I will discount them out of charity.  It’s not right to suspect such things of a person who loves you.  Sometimes I shock even myself.