Among the finest poets America has ever produced, Emily Dickinson (1830â"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. âI died for beauty â" but was scarceâ is considered one of Dickinsonâs major works and, unsurprisingly, centres around mortality. It is an allegorical death fantasy in the realm of Keats.