The Poet Assassinated

by Guillaume Apollinaire

CRONIAMANTAL

I love fountains, they are beautiful symbols of immortality when they never run dry. This one has never run dry. And I seek a divinity, but I desire her to appear eternal to me. And my fountain has never run dry.

He knelt and prayed to the fountain, while Tristouse, all in tears, lamented.

O poet, adorest thou the fountain? O Lord, return my lover to me! Come to me! I know such lovely songs.

CRONIAMANTAL

The fountain hath its murmur.

TRISTOUSE

Very well, then! Sleep with thy cold lover, let her drown thee! But if thou livest, thou belongest to me and thou shalt obey me.

She was gone, and throughout the forest of twittering birds, the fountain flowed and murmured, while there arose the voice of Croniamantal who wept and whose tears mingled with the worshipped flood.

CRONIAMANTAL