Poems (Cook)/Dust

by Eliza Cook

DUST.

 Dust! dust thou art old in fame,
For Man gain'd from thee his form and his name;
And though proud he may be of his noble line,
The haughtiest race are but sons of thine.
Thou wert the food of the first false thing
That glozingly coil'd with the hidden sting:
Thou wert cursed, and that curse is existing now,
While the furrow is moist with "the sweat of the brow."
Thou chokest the artisan over his toil,
Thou dwellest with skulls on the dead-strewn soil:
 Dust! dust! who shall distrust
Mingling with thee, and the moth, and the rust?

Heroes that look on ten thousand foes
With unshifting gaze and a firm repose,
From the coming dust will turn and shrink,
With retreating step and a cowardly wink.
The maiden's dark eyes shall conquer all,—
The prince and the peasant alike may fall;
But those brilliant orbs shall quail to meet
Old blustering March with his whirlwind sheet;
For the glance that bids each captive sigh,
Oh where is its might when there's "dust in the eye?"
 Dust! dust! thou art rudely thrust
On the present one's face and the past one's bust.

 Dust dust! where'er we may be,
In palace or hut, we are jostled by thee;
Scatter'd over Creation thy atoms we find;
Thou ridest on sunbeams and mountest the wind.
Thou art watch'd for and fear'd on the red, desert ground;
At the hearth of our home thou com'st eddying round;
On the threshold and housetops thy presence is seen,
On the high, mountain path and the hedgerow green:
In the cradle's fair crevice thou stealest to hide,
And thou'rt thrown on the coffin-lid, dimming its pride.
 Dust! dust! who shall distrust
Mingling with thee, and the moth, and the rust?

There's a famous old Dustman comes cleaning the way;
He gathers by night and he gathers by day;
He sorts the shroud-rags, he heaps gray bones,
And locks up his stores under marble stones:
When he comes for your ashes you know him full well,
For he carries a scythe instead of a bell:
His name—oh! whisper it under your breath,
For 'tis he the immortal old scavenger, Death:
Make ready—make ready, ye shall and ye must—
There's no putting him off when he calls for his dust.
 Dust! dust! who shall distrust
Mingling with thee, and the moth, and the rust?