MY DEAREST SUE

Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of Charles, wrote this lovely boyish poem for his sister Susan (Sue):
My dearest Sue
Of lovely hue
No sugar can be sweeter;
You do as far
Excel Su-gar
As sugar does saltpeter

So nice! I found it in the book The Lunar Men, by Jenny Uglow, an account of the life and times of a group of British
Enlightenment thinkers. The Lunar men included Erasmus Darwin, James Watt (see the steam engine) and Josiah Westwood (see famous porcelain).

The bond between brother and sister was exalted in previous centuries, as per William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, for example. Centuries later, the Romantics were mystified by the pull of blood, in a way which resembled the erotic. This trend culminated in Lord Byron's real life passionate and doomed love for his half-sister Augusta Byron.

Today, sibling love can still be romanticized, or even eroticized, as in Flowers in the Attic, the "incest classic", as one y/a (young adult fiction) website put it. And the love between suspected siblings Jace and Clary in The Mortal Instruments.

I hope you are enjoying a nice afternoon, always with beauty and a book!

Xxx😀