Portrait of an author: Erica Jong

Erica Jong: American novelist and poet

Last published: Love Comes First (Tarcher, 2009)

Suicides & spinsters—

all our kind!

Even decorous Jane Austen

never marrying,

& Sappho leaping,

& Sylvia in the oven,

& Anna Wickham, Tsvetaeva, Sara Teasdale,

& pale Virginia floating like Ophelia,

& Emily alone, alone, alone....

But you endure & marry,

go on writing,

lose a husband, gain a husband,

go on writing,

sing & tap dance

& you go on writing,

have a child & still

you go on writing,

love a woman, love a man

& go on writing.

You endure your writing

& your life.

Excerpted from Dear Colette (Becoming Light: Poems New and Selected), 1991

A 12-part series of portraits selected for Lounge by Rohit Chawla, who has photographed over 200 authors at the Jaipur Literature Festival over a decade.