I'm over seventy now,
an official of the first rank;
I know I should give up writing poetry,
but somehow I can't.
Mornings I sing like a cricket;
evenings I hoot like an owl.
I'm possessed by a devil I can't exorcise;
night and day it follows me stealthily around.
Once possessed, there's never a moment free;
a pretty mess it's got me in.
Day after day, I shrivel heart and liver
just to write a few poems.
Body fats and fluids depleted,
there's nothing left but skin and gristle.
Bones protruding, struggling to recite,
I strike a very foolish figure.
I have no words to elicit wonder,
nothing to pass on that will last a thousand years.
I clap my hands, guffaw, and when the laughing
bout subsides, I begin to recite again.
My life and death hang on poetry;
not even a physician could cure this disease.