So, now I’ve outlived Keats,
outlived Shelley, outlived Lermontov...
No blood coughed into the handkerchief,
no overturned boat,
no bullet arranged by the Tsar’s conspirators.
Death drew them in like smoke,
in thirst and sadness, broke their growth.
Too soon, too soon, the young love poet
fell beneath the long sought stroke.
