In the manner of Paul Verlaine

Yes, with a delicately airy, delicately half-definite brush of a lock of hair from my brow, I present the next poem in my continuing, unfolding series for Irina...

Poem for Irina, January 14, 2012

When imagination lights a candle, an emotion,

aware again, I am remade.  Now shade, now shelter;

I drink your voice from the summer rain—

let this rhapsody know its living roots.

As you help me take off my much sullied coat

of many memories, I am young again, love is

intense again; yes, we both have maps, but this

new land, this new garden, flowers exotically.

Your culture, mine, blend; the taste is sweet rain.

I look up: rain has begun to fall, our thirst

for each other belongs with every

fresh, fleeting line I conceive.

I believe; belief has power.  Each cloud,

each shower is laced with your promise.