“From the closed garden

Where our feet pace

Back and forth each day,

This gladiolus white…”

HILDA DOOLITTLE (1886–1961) was an American poet, novelist, and playwright known for her association with the illustrious Ezra Pound. She published under the pen name of H.D. She became a patient of Sigmund Freud to better express her bisexuality. Doolittle married once to the poet Richard Aldington, and undertook relationships with both women and men. She became an icon for both the LGBT rights and feminist movements when her poems, plays, letters and essays were given renewed attention during the latter decades of the twentieth century.