[While being prosecuted, Marie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d’Armont (27 July 1768 – 17 July 1793) said, among other things, in response to the prosecutor’s questioning, “Oh, the monster! He thinks I am a common assassin!” In response to insinuations that she had been moved by someone else to her action, she said coolly, “That shows poor knowledge of the human heart.” She had just stabbed Marat in his bathtub through his lung, aorta, and left ventricle.]
Corday: Virgo Intacta
She thought she had the gauge of Marat’s heart.
This white-dressed girl, ‘“l’ange de l’assassinat,”
Arranged her chaste white headgear for her part
In history. She failed to mention awe
Or joie de vivre on seeing his skin,
Disfigured by disease, the wounded chest
Enclosing spurting organ that was twin
To journalistic zealotry—the best
In human traits (Jeremiah, verse nine
In chapter seventeen). “I had no need
Of others’ hatred,” she testified. “Mine
Was adequate.” Purity was her creed.
The executioners came. She uncrowned
Herself. Fawn hair fell almost to the ground.