Parts 1, 2, and 3 here.

Hey again, folks. Last post in this series, which I have (true to form) been meaning to send out for absolute ages.

It's been a weird season here, y’all. Lots of upheaval, a logistically challenging change of apartments, a big heartbreak. Time to rest, time to actually start recovering from the burnout I've been dealing with since the back half of 2023, time to mend my own heart and figure out what goals I want to run towards now. It's been the worst of times, but I hope I'm setting myself up for some of the best of times this year.

Pursuant to that, before I get into the meat of this post: I've been going to some open mics lately, performing Claribel songs for people, and that's been one of the best things about this year so far. If you're a Chicago person or just traveling to the area, you should stop by! Here's where you can find me.

• Uncommon Ground (Clark and Grace): Sundays, 5-7 PM (signups at 4)

• Eli Tea Bar (Clark and Catalpa): Fridays, 8-10 PM (signups at 7:30)

• Hopefully Shakers on Clark — gonna check it out tomorrow! Mondays, 5:30 PM to whenever (signups at 5:15)

(Huh, I guess I'm just tearing up Clark Street.)

Anyway, now let's cut to the chase and get to the good gay stuff. In this series so far, we've gone through Claribel's life, or at least what fits into an identifiable chronology — but I've got a few more bits of poetry I couldn't place in the timeline to share, and also some conjectures as to who Claribel's various love interests might have been.

Onwards, then!

Undated poems or fragments

I have no idea where these fit in the timeline, but they definitely also, uh, don’t exactly disprove my whole big Unifying Theory of Sapphism here.

[Have you forgotten quite, love?]

Have you forgotten quite, love,
The lovely autumn days,
When we sat so still and calm, love,
On the sheaves of golden maize;
When the robins sang to cheer us,
And the ringdove's coos were clear,
And the poppies waved in the wind, love,
And the swallows circled near?

And have you forgotten quite, love,
The slender grassy blade
From which we drank the dew, love,
Beneath the chestnut's shade?
You helped the giddy bee, love,
From the clover at your feet,
For he could not mount to fly, love,
With his load of honey sweet.

And have you forgotten quite, love,
Those clouds we watched together,
All rosy and gold in a silver fold,
In the still, calm summer weather?
Oh no! you remember well, love,
The charm of those autumn days;
And the thought of them lingers yet, love,
In the heart of these simple lays.

Augh, my heart.

[fragment]

...Nor think, nor dream of that sad heart
Whose only thought and dream thou art.

I swear I remember there being more to this one somewhere in Phyllis’s papers, but I could be wrong.

[fragment]

...O happy thrushes sing today your welcome to the blooms of May,
O sing a song to my sad heart, to bid its load of care depart.
I would that I could sing as well, I would that I could simply tell
My story to the flowers of Spring, as ye sweet warblers sadly sing.

A weird number of Charlotte’s poems or fragments thereof, this one included, mention being really sad in the springtime — as a recurring thing, seemingly. That, to me, makes it feel a lot less likely that she’s talking about mourning her mother… who, again, died just after Christmas in 1847. I think there’s someone else she’s mourning here, someone who died (or otherwise left her) in springtime.

Quiet Eyes [fragment]

Living sapphires flash true and tender
Under lashes black and long...........

Now, you’re not going to believe this, but those two lines are scrawled very lightly in Claribel’s music manuscript book — no music, not even a melody, just a couple clefs —

— and then the next page is torn out. There’s just the tiniest couple scrawls visible on the torn bit, but no way I’ll be able to make out what they say. The next musical fragment in this book is as follows:

I fain would banish memory
Oh help me to forget

Were those two fragments part of the same poem or song originally? It seems possible, at least.

[the Italian maid fragment]

Therefore I fain would cry
”Pax” to the matchless foe
Therefore I fain would try
To break her cruel [bow].
'Tis a strange form of vice
That an Italian maid
So learned so precise
So sober & so staid

Emphases hers, not mine. But yeah, that’s where this one cuts off too!!! The paper below that is also torn off!!! Help, I can’t deal with all this.

Prime candidates for big ol’ lesbian crushes

I don't think we're dealing with just one lady love interest here. I'm inclined to think between two and four, over her lifetime; I wish I had more specific evidence, but that's my gut feeling.

That said, though, I do have my suspicions about who might have been the objects of Charlotte's interests, crushes, unrequited love, and/or situationships. In no particular order:

• Barbara Hollway. Lifelong spinster, for what it's worth. And as I expounded on in part 3, if what happened between these two in 1866 wasn't gay in some form, I will eat my hat.

• Victoria Alexandrina, Lady Yarborough. Course, Lady Sophia MacNamara (per part 3, again) could have just been complaining more generally about Lady Y “making such a fuss of” Charlotte, but these attentions could have also had queer dimensions. The recurrence of the high/low motif in a good bit of this poetry (e.g. “thou wert so high above me”) could also make sense if it's about a member of the nobility, someone a step above the regular ol’ upper ten thousand.

• Mary Gifford. Poor gal’s marriage had gone to hell in a handbasket (“Take Back the Heart” is very much inspired by her terrible husband), there’s the “Only a Woman’s Hair” thing, and idk it’d be cute if Charlotte's duology of Mary poems was addressed to an actual Mary.

• Emily Faithfull, mainly because it seems so likely they were neighbors for a few years. Also, the lyrics to Claribel's “Marion’s Song” were written by someone going only by “E.F.,” and an “E.F.” (the same one, maybe, it's hard to tell) added ending stanzas to a few of Charlotte's incomplete poems in Thoughts, Verses, and Songs. I don't have much evidence here yet, only vague shapes of places where evidence could go… but still.

• Charlotte Sainton-Dolby. I don't have a ton of conviction about this one, but they seem at the very least like super close friends. It’s also interesting to me that CSD got married so comparatively late (at age 39); she could seemingly support herself through her music career for a good while. We stan a gal who could be any degree of financially independent in the Victorian era, tbh.

• Marianne North. She’s best known nowadays as a badass botanical illustrator (seriously, look her up, she was incredible). Before she pursued her world-traveling, plant-drawing agenda on a more full-time basis, though, she was actually training to be a professional singer under fellow contralto Charlotte Sainton-Dolby. Claribel’s song “O, My Lost Love,” a setting of a Jean Ingelow poem, is dedicated to Marianne, so I'm sure they met and were at least acquainted. Given that Marianne was also one of those lifelong spinsters and probably sapphic into the bargain, she's on my gaydar here.

• Elizabeth Philp, one of Charlotte's popular-ballad-penning peers. I would be shocked if they never met, given that they worked in the same genre and both published a lot of songs with Boosey and Co. Elizabeth was another lifelong spinster, and her obituary in The Musical Standard mentions how famed lesbian thespian Charlotte Cushman kickstarted Philp’s musical career:

“...early in life [Elizabeth] made the acquaintance of Miss Charlotte Cushman, whose guest she was at the Isle of Wight. Miss Cushman one evening had been reading to Miss Philp some of Mr. J. Russell Lowell’s poems, and in the middle of the night the young girl stole down to the piano, and improvised the music to ‘O moonlight deep and tender.’ Miss Cushman at once recognised the precious though untutored talent of her young visitor, and by her advice Miss Philp was sent to Paris, where she became the pupil of Garcia and Madame Marchesi. …” - E.H.T., The Musical Standard, December 5, 1885

Honorable mention here goes to the novelist and poet Caroline Clive, who only met Claribel once in early July 1868, but then proceeded to write her the actual gayest poem ever:

Lines to Claribel — Written After a First Interview.

Perhaps I shall never see thee more,
One hour ago, the last,
I had not seen, I was to see,
And now, and now 'tis past.

I thought, Is she the thing I dreamt?
What presence does she wear?
I've seen thy face, I've heard thy voice,
Ah dreams, how weak ye were.

I've heard the voice that entered in
The heart's most holy place,
Saw the white hand creating sound
Reflected in her face.

I felt her soul touched with the charm
Of beauty, which it found
In every least and greatest thing
That nature spreads around.

She came and passed, and there is now
A blank, a silence, where
That gracious presence filled the scene
So spirit-full and fair.

Once in Italian skies I saw
A pile of glory reared,
Shapes, hues, beyond belief of man,
And then it disappeared.

Not so, not so, O Lady dear,
Do thou my path forsake;
List the recalling spell I weave,
For Mind and Music's sake.

(Did you think I was kidding?)

Fin!

If you've made it this far, then thank you, from the bottom of my bisexual heart, for reading my personal “there is no Carol in HR” conspiracy board. I’d love to know y’all’s thoughts!