Whether his poems, which were distinctly unselfconscious, were a reflection of his mental problems or an escape from them is anyone's guess. But here is one in which he recognized who he was.
I feel I am, I only know I am,
And plod upon the earth as dull and void:
Earth's prison chilled my body with its dram
Of dullness, and my soaring thoughts destroyed.
I fled to solitudes from passion's dream,
But strife pursued — I only know I am.
I was a being created in the race
Of men, disdaining bounds of place and time,
A spirit that could travel o'er the space
Of earth and heaven, like a thought sublime —
Tracing creation, like my Maker free, —
A soul unshackled — like eternity:
Spurning earth's vain and soul debasing thrall —
But now I only know I am, — that's all.