Cummings' first marriage, to Elaine Orr, his cousin, began as a love affair in 1918 while she was still married to Scofield Thayer, one of Cummings' friends from Harvard. During this time he wrote a good deal of his erotic poetry.Selected Poems, Ed. Richard S. Kennedy, Liveright, 1994. After divorcing Thayer, Orr married Cummings on March 19, 1924. The couple had a daughter together out of wedlock. However, the couple separated after two months of marriage and divorced less than nine months later.
