Dim Lady

“Sonnet CCXIX: On Laura Putting Her Hand Before Her Eyes Before He Was Gazing On Her” by Francesco Petrarca

Francesco Petrarca, or Petrarch, was an Italian poet born in 1304. Petrarch’s collection of love poems for a woman named Laura immortalized the Petrarchan sonnet form and his idealized love for Laura, a woman he never actually met. Petrarch is often erroneously credited with the invention of the sonnet; in actuality, obscure Italian poet Giacomo da Lentini engineered the sonnet structure more than one hundred years before Petrarch mastered the form.

“Sonnet 130” by William Shakespeare (1609)

English playwright and poet William Shakespeare wrote this sonnet in 1609. One of a 154-sonnet series, the poem is a satire of many contemporary conventions of courtly love poems that were fashionable. Mullen’s “Dim Lady” is an homage to this sonnet, which similarly downplays the attractive qualities of a Dark Lady whilst emphasizing the emotional connection between speaker and beloved.

“A Carafe That is a Blind Glass” by Gertrude Stein (1914)

Language poets like Mullen often credit avant-garde American poet and modernist icon Gertrude Stein as an inspiration. Stein, who lived from 1874 to 1946, was also a playwright and novelist.