Among the finest poets America has ever produced, Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) lived a life of quiet solitude. A master of the short lyric poem, her eccentric preoccupation with death and immortality permeated many of her greatest works. “I died for beauty – but was scarce” is considered one of Dickinson’s major works and, unsurprisingly, centres around mortality. It is an allegorical death fantasy in the realm of Keats.