He is haunted by a demon, a demon against which
he feels powerless, because in its first manifestation
it has not face, no name, nothing; and the words the
poems he makes are a kind of . . . exorcism of this demon..
                 T. S. Eliot  The Three Demons

i

Bits of life are smeared
on the walls of their pages.
But nothing appeases.
They are haunted by a demon, lured
by voices of desire, whispers
in the night, sounds, shadows,
echoes demanding more and more
and more, bending nerves
a snap nearer.

ii

Sappho, hearing the cries echoing from
the rocks, flung her self into the tide.
Poe lost his way chasing the black bird
whistling in the dark. Crane plunged 
his final obsession into the sea.
Thomas tolled until his voice cracked.
Sylvia sprawled in the dark leaving others
to ponder the rage. Hearing voices on the road,
Jarrell slipped and didn’t make it
to the other side.. Sexton roamed
the moonlight until the wind left
her breath. Berryman cast his tongue into
the river leaving only the sound of his shadow.

iii

There is a tide where once seized
by the current, there is no anchor
• only the rushing down, down,
down the raging torrent until
finally you drop.

They were at that current
which drags to the depths.

iv

I am the ravisher of the rose,
the termite of the night that gnaws
into the fragile sap of the poet's skull.
the Demon of More that grins
at the silver madness in the poet’s eyes.
I am the poet's possessed ear beckoning
from the cliffs of Lesbos to Mexikan gulf
from the flats of London to the Lorelei
where heads crack against the rocks
and spray their echoes across the Rhine.