Lowell's partner Ada Dwyer Russell was the subject of many of Lowell's romantic poems,[19] and Lowell wanted to dedicate her books to Russell, but Russell would not allow that, and relented only once for Lowell's biography of John Keats, in which Lowell wrote, "To A.D.R., This, and all my books. A.L."[9]: 62 Examples of these love poems to Russell include the Taxi, Absence, A Lady [20]: xxi In a Garden, Madonna of the Evening Flowers,[21] Opal,[22] and Aubade.[23] Lowell admitted to John Livingston Lowes that Russell was the subject of her series of romantic poems titled "Two Speak Together".[24][25] Lowell's poems about Russell have been called the most explicit and elegant lesbian love poetry during the time between the ancient Sappho and poets of the 1970s.[23] Most of the private correspondence in the form of romantic letters between the two were destroyed by Russell at Lowell's request, leaving much unknown about the details of their life together.[20]: 47
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