And I'd been so sure he was going to die that through my tears I'd drawn him on his deathbed. I must confess I even had formal con-cerns. Next day he was walking around Paris, strong and majestic. One morning at Sacré-Coeur de Montmartre two big black cats squeezed me between them. A voice said "Don't be afraid!" Sacré Coeur looked like one of those pink fortresses that adorn the summits of Italian hills and he, Guillaume, high above, was like a bird with a man's head. Was he dead, our dear lyricist? My drawing wasn't finished. I bumped into him leading a group of disciples: was it he or Dante? Very much alive. Of course! Guillaume was not dead. A stout and clever priest said to me "There's no one more alive than Guillaume Apollinaire. But finish your drawing of his death and put a silhouette of me on the lower left-hand side." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...TO TWO UNKNOWN LADIES by AMY LOWELL CHARLOTTE CORDAY (REVOLUTIONARY TRIBUNAL, JULY 17, 1793) by EDGAR LEE MASTERS DON JUAN: DEDICATION [OR, INVOCATION] by GEORGE GORDON BYRON THE BALLAD OF THE FOXHUNTER by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS IF I GROW OLD by ETHEL BERRY ALLEN ON THE RHINE by MATTHEW ARNOLD OXFORD IN WAR-TIME by LAURENCE BINYON |