The fiery passion-angel
By cemetery side -
Romanticism's avenger -
Took us upon a ride

Through all the passion's ranges
From heartbreak to delight,
Into and through derangement
And gave us second sight -

Through rapture and through sorrow
Through beauty and through wrath
Through sunlight and through snowstorm
And through both life and death:

Leading half-way to heaven
Leading half-way to bliss
And, like a pitch-black raven,
Pitching upon the trees

From which it cawed and muttered
And, with my soul in beak,
Threw me into a gutter
Wherefrom I now speak.

It was a gorgeous journey,
It was a glorious ride,
Running in early morning
Out to the riverside,

Holding you, gently breathing,
With your head next to mine,
Tenderness endless feeling
With our hearts intertwined,

Kissing you softly sleeping
On the dock in my arms,
Feeling the passion deepen
Under the flashing stars,

Doing, in exaltation,
Pull-ups off trees and walls,
Feeling the inspiration
Reaching impassioned souls,

Learning French, and embracing
Upon a waterbed,
On a lakeside undressing
Inside a sleeping bag,

Reciting Blake and Coleridge
Hearing your brilliant speech
Acquiring truth and knowledge -
What more could I beseech:

You are like stars in heaven,
You are like wind and rain,
You are like moon and Neptune
You are both joy and pain -

I fathom all that happened
And whether I'm in rue
Or whether I am happy
I won't get over you.

In beauty that we shared,
Passion that through us coursed
Is end to all despair
And end to every curse:

Taking to divine splendor
Taking to the truths sublime
Where I can't sit, lie or stand or
See, but feel space and time

Before this passion melting,
Turning soft in my glove,
As from it I am smelting
The sculpture to our love -

From truth that you've awakened
Comes knowledge of the whole
And, if I'm not mistaken,
Keys to the human soul.

I'll take what you have given
And use it as a key
To place where all's forgiven
And all the paths are free -

To reach higher and deeper
Uniting sky and earth
And in my heart to keep her -
Love to which we gave birth.

The passion's flaming angel
Broke through the clouds to forge
Upon the divine anvil
A burning blowtorch

Melding the pearls and iron
Into a wedding ring
And into its environs
Bringing eternal spring,

Puncturing through the seeming
There to avail of light -
Angel of passion, dreaming
From day into the night.

The messenger of passion
Took me into the sky
And I took a concussion
While learning there to fly -

And, as I was still dreaming
Of living in the sky,
The angel turned a demon
And screamed at me to die.

Ilya Shambat
https://sites.google.com/view/ilyashambatpoetry