Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


DUST by DOLORES CAIRNS

First Line: I SAID, BEING HUMBLE
Last Line: OF THIS TERRIBLE DUST?
Subject(s): DUST; HUMILITY;

I said, being humble,
What is there for me to write about?
I may not aspire to the high themes
Of the great.

I said, being very humble,
I will write about dust.
I went forth and looked at dust.

Dust . . .
Swirling in endless garlands over a white road in the wind;
Settling in deliberate silence on the unused furniture
Of an old house;
Little heaps of dust under shabby tombstones;
Dropping multitudinously upon the earth;
Rocks, trees, mountains, animals, people, palaces, nations.

Who am I
That I should presume to write on the grandeur
Of this terrible dust?



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