Margaret Fuller Slack
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would have been as great as George EliotBut for an untoward fate.For look at the photograph of me made by Penniwit,Chin resting on hand, and deep—set eyes—Gray, too, and far-searching.But there was the old, old problem:Should it be celibacy, matrimony or unchastity?Then John Slack, the rich druggist, wooed me,Luring me with the promise of leisure for my novel,And I married him, giving birth to eight children,And had no time to write.It was all over with me, anyway,When I ran the needle in my handWhile washing the baby’s things,And died from lock—jaw, an ironical death.Hear me, ambitious souls,Sex is the curse of life.
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