faint-inducing.
I hold him in great esteem.
Still, Byron is renowned
as the most dangerous man
in Europe.
I cannot conjecture
what scheming Claire has done
to earn his favor,
but Byron asks to see
me.
I find Byron amiable, delightful even,
despite accusations to the contrary.
He is more intelligent
than are his characters
and more gentle than
his menagerie of exotic pets.
He praises Shelley’s Queen Mab
and speaks of how he admires
my father’s writings and philosophy.
It serves as a perfectly
convivial meeting,
and we pledge
to find another occasion
to share company.
But why Claire
insisted
that she arrange
this introduction now
I have yet to discover.
WHAT OF BYRON
Spring 1816
I ask Claire to explain
what is happening,
why she bid me see Byron,
the famous man,
the Napoleon of literature.
What is her connection
to him?
She hesitates
and then insists that she sought
his literary advice
about the play she is writing
and her idea to become an actress,
but I know that is not all.
Finally she says,
“You have your Shelley
and I have my Byron.
I have found a poet
to love too and he
is celebrated throughout
Europe, dear sister.”
Her eyes twinkle
as she awaits my response.
“Oh Claire,
what have you done?
The man’s reputation
precedes him.
He is like summer rain;
he comes and goes
as he pleases
and needs no one.
They say he loves
but one and that is his sister.
Dear Clary, what have you dug
yourself into?”
Claire fixes hard upon
my brow like she might
sear me alive.
“You and Shelley eloped
after only three months.
I have been writing
and spending time with Byron
for two. Why should you think
this would be any less
of a love affair than yours?”
She looks to stomp out
of the room, but I grasp her arm.
“No one has said that,
dear sister. I just worry for you.
Byron and Shelley
are not necessarily the same.”
“I have pledged my love
to Byron and promised
that you and Shelley and I
will visit him in Geneva.
He gave me his address.”
I shake my head.
I know not what plot
Claire has afoot, but I fear
it will not work as she expects.
TRAVEL ABROAD
May 1816
Claire determines
our next adventure.
And Shelley is eager to embark
on another journey.
He excites at the prospect
like a child crawling toward
his favorite rattle.
We will go to Geneva
so that Shelley
might be acquainted with
the great Lord Byron.
I weary to take William,
only five months old,
on such an excursion,
but I also believe
there might be something
of my destiny wrapped
up in Geneva, that
perhaps travel
and another meeting
with Lord Byron
may unlock some yet
untapped secret inside of me.
Shelley and I both know
that I must live up
to the standards of my birth,
after all. And I have not
been writing as much lately
with a new baby.
And because
Shelley sets his heart
upon this journey
and I cannot bear
to be without him
for a year, I must go.
After ten days of travel
through France,
by carriage not foot,
as we learned our lesson
the last voyage, we arrive
in Switzerland.
I awe once again
over the majesty of this landscape,
over its beauty and terror
like a creature otherworldly.
We arrive before Lord Byron,
but Claire pleases to note
that letters have been left
for him at the post,
so he must be on his way.
GENEVA
May 1816
We take a suite of rooms
at the Hôtel d’Angleterre
on the periphery of Geneva.
Claire cannot be contented
as she visits the post office
daily only to find that Byron
has not yet arrived.
Shelley and I feel as happy
as fledgling birds,
without a care as to what twig
we light upon. I have found new wings
here. The Alps entrance
and energize me. We rent
a small sailboat and do not
return until ten in the evening,
reading and writing all day.
We translate my father’s
Political Justice into French,
and I am writing a children’s
book for Father to publish.
This is the land
where Milton, Voltaire,
and Rousseau have lived.
One breathes literature here.
And I am in love with it.
THE ARRIVAL OF THE GREAT POET
May 25, 1816
Byron travels in a huge carriage
modeled after one Napoleon designed,
complete with a bed,
pulled by ten horses.
He attracts crowds along his route.
And he is rumored to have taken
a liking to a few chambermaids
during his passage. He travels
with his longtime valet, Fletcher,
and his personal physician,
John Polidori, who also has
literary aspirations and writes
an account of his travels with the great poet.
As soon as Byron arrives at the hotel,
where he signs in as being
one hundred years old, I imagine
weary from travel,
Claire besieges Byron with letters.
She follows his every move
for two days and then
accosts him as he returns
from a boat trip,
Shelley and I as unknowing
accomplices.
The great poet
and my Shelley get on splendidly
at first meeting
as if they had been childhood friends.
Byron and Shelley
look very opposite,
Shelley fair and Byron dark.
The younger Shelley frail,
while Byron at twenty-eight
stands more robust and athletic.
Shelley’s voice pitches high
as a schoolboy’s
while Byron’s is bass and dramatic
as the scenery.
One might imagine them
to be too different to get along
and yet they seem to fit
as light and shadow.
Byron invites Shelley to dinner.
Claire and I are not to be
in attendance.
OUR GROUP OF FIVE
June 1816
Well it seems
that our community
shall be a group of five
this summer—
Shelley, Byron, Claire, Polidori,
and me.
Shelley and Byron boat
around the lake
and my Shelley tells me
how they have discussed
all manner of art, literature,
science, politics, and philosophy.
I try not to feel envy
that I spend my day
listening to Claire despair
that she has not shared
enough company with Lord Byron.
She asks me what to do
to make him desire her more,
and I scratch my head.
Her persistent cawing
does little to improve
her position I think,
but I am proven wrong
and Byron invites her
to his side one evening.
I stick firmly to my regimen
of reading and writing
to keep me sane.
My little baby
William thrives in this climate.
I feel something begin
to stir inside me here
amidst the mountains,
and it is not a child.
A STIRRING
June 1816
Like the quiet before
brews within me.
It is as if I awaken
from a dream
without language
into a landscape
of words.
The people
and topography,
both grand and inspiring,
envelop me.
I hear a voice
and know it to be
my own.
STORMS IN GENEVA
June 1816
We transfer from the hotel
to a waterside cottage
called Maison Chapuis
on the southern shore
where Shelley and Byron
can keep a boat.
The storms here illuminate
the sky like gods pointing
fingers of light above the earth.
The lake reflects the mountains
as the moon reflects the sun,
so brilliant in flashes of night.
The clouds cast an overall
eerie atmosphere
that excites the senses.
You smell the rain coming,
feel the thunder tremble
through you as though
you were the drum of the sky.
I have never witnessed such storms.
When the two poets
drift out on the lake
and a storm begins to blow in,
Byron sings to calm his nerves.
You can hear his voice
just above the lap of the water.
We are forced inside
most nights because
of the turbulent weather this summer.
I delight in the company
of everyone, except perhaps
Claire, although she behaves better
now that she shares Byron’s bed
from time to time.
VILLA DIODATI AND THE MAN-MONSTER
June 10, 1816
Byron rents the much larger
Villa Diodati, the prettiest place
on all the lake, and just
a ten-minute walk from our house.
John Milton’s schoolmate had been
Charles Diodati, so Byron loves
the villa for its literary history.
Because of Byron’s reputation
he is not allowed much privacy.
English tourists rent telescopes
from the hotel to spy on him
from across the lake.
They view tablecloths on the line
as petticoats and assume
that we ladies remove our petticoats
when we accompany Byron.
He is accused of corrupting
all the ladies of the rue Basse.
Thank goodness the rain keeps
Byron and his visitors mainly indoors.
Still the rumors abound
that he sleeps with both
of the Godwin girls,
meaning Claire and me,
and that Shelley and he
have formed “A League of Incest.”
This is wrong and ill
on many levels,
as none of us are related
and Byron is having an affair
with Claire alone.
Still Lord Byron
will not acknowledge her
as his mistress.
POLLY DOLLY
June 15, 1816
John Polidori appears
to have developed
feelings for me.
I view him as a younger
brother.
Today as I stroll
up the hill toward the villa,
the rain has made
the ground slick
and Byron urges Polidori
to be gallant and jump down
from the balcony and offer
me his arm. At once Polidori
swings himself over the rail,
but he slips badly as he hits
the ground and sprains his ankle
much to the delight of Lord Byron.
Byron and I aid him inside
to elevate his foot.
John blushes from embarrassment.
And it seems that Polidori
will be limping now for some time.
Perhaps Byron
should hold back his laughter
and enjoy having the company
of another who limps about
as Byron himself has one leg
shorter than the other
and always walks with a slight limp
he tries to obscure.
Of course none of us
would dare to mention it
out of courtesy and fear
that the wrath of the great Lord
would avalanche upon us.
ROUTINE
June 1816
Byron works best late into the dawn,
falling asleep as the sun seeps
into his room. He does not
so Shelley and I spend
mornings studying, reading,
and sailing together. We hire
someone to care for little William.
Claire is as entangled
as a fly caught in a spider’s web
in her pursuit of Lord Byron.
She finds little interest
in spending time with just us.
I discover a new
rival for my lover’s attention.
The men enjoy boating and speaking, alone.
Byron does not admire
the words and thoughts of a woman
as does Shelley.
He sees women more
as playthings to be used
and tossed aside
than as useful, educated minds
to be probed.
Byron directs our conversations
at night when the five
of us are driven inside
by rain and darkness.
He usually asks his questions
specifically to Shelley
as if neither Claire nor Polidori nor I
add anything
to his enrichment of the topic.
I, the ever faithful Dormouse,
listen attentively as they speak
of science and mysticism,
storing away
morsels of information
for later use.
A WATCH FOR FANNY
June 1816
Shelley and I venture
into Geneva
to find a pocket watch
for Fanny,
one that winds
and will stand
on its own
as she so often does.
She is a keeper
of the times to us
and sends us
letters of home
since our arrival here.
Sometimes a hint
of her desire to be
with us scents
the letters, but I think
she cannot imagine
being ostracized by Father.
Steady as a clock
that ticks with precision
and delicacy,
she is as golden
as the one
we select for her.
FLUTTER STORIES
June 16, 1816
Storms thrash the trees
and rain beats upon the roof
as though stones may penetrate
the ceiling. Tonight Byron
selects a volume of German ghost stories
translated into French to read to us,
stories designed to flutter the heartbeat,
so that our insides will tremble
in rhythm with the torrent outside.
The candlelight flickers
as he intones tales of twin sisters,
one of whom dies and is reanimated
and takes the place of her sister
with her new bridegroom.
Another recounts a tale
of a girl who disobeys
her father to marry a man
and then ends up losing
her baby and being abandoned
by her husband.
I delight to jump
as the thunder claps above us,
and I feel the spirit of imitation
arrive among us.
Byron suggests we each
write a ghost story,
Shelley, Polidori, Claire, he, and I.
He tells me we shall publish
ours together because I seem
particularly captivated by this contest.
I feel that he may be correct;
something besides the storm
alights my nerves this evening.
Byron says we shall see
who among us writes the best story.
CREATIVE ENDEAVORS
June 1816
I busy myself
to think of a story,
but sadly the muse does not
arrive. I want to speak
to the mysterious fears
of our nature and to awaken
thrilling horror.
Nothing comes to me.
Shelley begins a story
about the experiences
of his early life, but
abandons it because he
is more adept at embodying
the emotions and ideas
of brilliant imagery
and in writing musical verse
than in the mechanics of story
these days.
Byron sets right to work
on a story about an aristocrat
traveling in Turkey who is possessed
by a mysterious secret. But Byron
grows bored with his pages