With the stroke of a brush
the artist makes the fallen hero beautiful
smoothing the ravages of illness
that marred his skin;
a reposing pietà, sublime in his baptismal font,
asleep, but for
the tell-tale violence of his death:
the bathwater stained red
by the hear that bled for France,
his fallen hand still holding the pen
that named himself l’ami du pueple,
a revolutionary
patron saint of the Cult of Reason
who enflamed a reign of terror,
who sought the execution of a king,
and signed the orders for the deaths of countless more,
now limp and beautiful in the golden morning light.
With a stroke of the brush,
history remembers the martyr, the hero, the saint
and not
the dermatitic demagogue
who died alone in his bathtub.
boats against the current 