THE DARK MAN

By Stephen King

I have stridden the fuming way

of sun-hammered tracks and smashed cinders;
I have ridden rail sand burned sterno
in the gantry silence of hob jungles: I am a dark man.

I have ridden rails

and passed the smuggery
of desperate houses with counterfeit chimneys
and heard from the outside
the inside clink of cocktail ice
while closed doors broke the world –
and over it all a savage sickle moon
that bummed my eyes with bones of light.

I have slept in glaring swamps

where musk-reek rose
to mix with the sex smell of rotting cypress stumps
where witch fire clung in sunken
psycho spheres of baptism –
and heard the suck of shadows
where a gutted columned house
leeched with vines
speaks to an overhung mushroom sky

I have fed dimes to cold machines

in all night filling stations
while traffic in a mad and flowing flame
streaked red in six lanes of darkness,
and breathed the cleaver hitchhike wind
within the breakdown lane with thumb leveled
and saw shadowed faces made complacent
with heaters behind safety glass
faces that rose like complacent moons
in riven monster orbits.
and in a sudden jugular flash
cold as the center of a sun

I forced a girl in a field of wheat

and left her sprawled with the virgin bread
a savage sacrifice
and a sign to those who creep infixed ways:

Stephen King, American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy
fiction.“The Dark Man” was published in Ubris 1969 and later in Moth, 1970
 ELEMENTS AND FORMS OF POETRY

I. Theme – The author, Stephen King, envision a faceless man in cowboy boots and jeans and
a denim jacket forever walking the roads. Later on, people found out that the Dark Man that
Stephen King was talking about in the poem is actually Randall Flagg. Randall Flagg is a
villain his series The Dark Tower that was published in 1982. The latest book of the said
series was released last September 2004.
II. Speaker/Persona – The speaker on the poem is the dark man himself.
III. Dramatic Situation – The poem talks about this guy in cowboy boots who moved around on
the roads, mostly hitchhiking at night, always wore jeans and a denim jacket. The idea of a
villain as somebody who was always on the outside looking in and hated people who had
good fellowship and good conversation and friends was shown in the poem.
IV. Diction – “I have ridden rails”, “I have slept in glaring swamps”, “I am a dark man”. These
words suggest the plot of the poem, they are abstract and concrete dictions for they describe
physical physiques and emotions.
V. Figures of Speech:
a. Simile and Metaphor
i. “and in a sudden jugular flash, cold as the center of a sun“, this part is
where the author showed how the dark ma killed the said girl, the action
was fast and her jugular veins were cold.
ii. “left her sprawled with the virgin bread, a savage sacrifice”, In this
sentence, the author compared the body of a girl to a virgin bread and
savage sacrifice which means he left the body looking untouched but was
domesticated by a human.
b. Personification- “I have slept in glaring swamps
VI. Tone – The tone of the poem suggest horror. It also shows the melancholy of the dark man.

Stephen King, American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy
fiction.“The Dark Man” was published in Ubris 1969 and later in Moth, 1970