Robespierre at Madame Tussaud's
by Alla

My pilgrimage certainly was overdue
My fear had kept me from coming to you

For long time I’d wondered what it would feel like
To see a beloved one’s head on a spike
What if I feel sickened, or break down in tears?
Yet love in the end has outweighed all my fears

I came, and at last your dear image I saw,
Preserved as a relic by Madame Tussaud

Oh my dearest Friend, oh how black oh how cold
This show, this circus, glory of our world!
You have done so much for the triumph of good
Your great sacrifice is still misunderstood

My soul was with you as I was standing there
I sighed and my breath reached your long, lifeless hair

You have been beheaded, abused, treated rough
Yet somehow the Fate did not think it enough
When, eighteen unbearable hours before,
A pistol shot terribly injured your jaw

Then, moments before death, by hand of Sanson
From your face your bandage was cruelly torn

Throughout the square the crowd heard your scream
Oh can you forgive us, my dearest Maxime?

Your pain with your life ended by guillotine,
Your agony is still so vividly seen
Your last darkest hours that your wrestled with pain
Imprinted on your face forever remain

Yet it almost seems your face could come awake
Your dignity death never managed to take

I stood there so still, as I gazed at you, Max
That some thought I, too, was a figure of wax

I awe and in mourning I bowed my head
How strange that someone who is so loved, is dead

Forgive me my sadness, oh my dearest Guide
It’s time that I stopped thinking of how you died
I send you my love, and I hope, and I pray
That my life, like yours, may serve Freedom one day.