Melisande

What do you do?

I couldn’t bring myself

to write a “you’re untrue”

type letter.  It wouldn’t do.

They’re back from Jersey now,

he and his fat old woman.

 

What did I do?

How did I let him down?

I would take him back

in a heartbeat,

despite this indiscreet

and ugly business.

What did I lack?

 

Next Wednesday marks five.

If I’m still alive,

I’ll pass it alone.

How did it come to this?

How did I miss?

 

He begged me

to be his wife.

If not, he’d take his life.

What does anything mean?

 

I didn’t have a plan.

Just insupportable pain.

I wandered about in the rain

with the revolver in my purse.

I passed the Madeleine

and Strasbourg, in black,

and knew I wasn’t going back.

 

Between the Obelisk and Brest

I held the damn thing

to my chest. 

The rest’s a blur.

I woke up here in the Hotel Dieu.

 

They said it’s lodged,

the lump of lead,

behind my heart.

It has to stay there.

Far too near

a vertebra to operate.

At any rate,

I’ll wear his souvenir

until I’m dead.

 

Author's Note

Melisande: Lilly Texier, the protagonist of the poem, is likening herself to the tragic heroine of the Debussy opera, Pelleas and Melisande.
(2) They’re back from Jersey now: Claude Debussy, the French composer, entered into an affair with Emma Bardac while he was married to Lilly. In the autumn of 1904, he took Emma to the Channel Islands and on landing back in France, wrote a letter to Lilly, announcing that their marriage was over.
(3) his fat old woman: Lilly was a beauty and a fashion model. Emma was 42, with adult children.
(4) Next Wednesday marks five: Lilly shot herself on Friday October 14, 1904. The following Wednesday was her fifth wedding anniversary.
(5) How did I miss?: She could be asking how she failed as a wife. Alternatively, she could be asking how she could shoot herself in the chest, and not die.
(6) He begged me: One of the ironies of the break-up is that it was Debussy who had originally threatened suicide, when Lilly hesitated over marrying him.
(7) the Madeleine: The famous neoclassical church at the top of the Rue Royale, near to the spot where Lilly tried to take her life.
(8) Strasbourg, in black: There are eight statues in the Place de la Concorde, each representing a French city. Between 1870 and 1918, when Strasbourg was annexed to Germany, the people of Paris regularly draped the statue of Strasbourg in mourning. Seeing the black festoons, Lilly makes up her mind to shoot herself.
(9) Between the Obelisk and Brest: Lilly positions herself near the point where the Champs-Elysees flows into the Place de la Concorde, between the Egyptian Obelisk and the statue of the city of Brest. Whether she knows it or not, she has selected the exact spot where Marie Antoinette was beheaded.
(10) Hotel Dieu: A large hospital alongside Notre Dame cathedral.
(11) until I’m dead: Though Lilly survived, the bullet remained jammed in her spine for the remaining 30 years of her life.
(12) Photo: Debussy and Lilly, during their marriage. He claimed that she wasn’t artistic enough, and he sought creative stimulation elsewhere. He certainly appears bored here!