[BNP/E3, 78 – 92]

SONG OF DIRT.

     Come, let us speak of dirt!

     God's curse is on our head.

     Let our lips irreverence blurt!

We are sufferers all; let us, instead

Of prayer, offer God the sacrifice

Of our minds that he curst with crime and vice,

Of our frames that diseases make dread!

     Let us offer the tyrant of all,

To hang in the hall of his palace of pain,

             A funeral pall,

And a bride's white dress with a stain,

And a widow's weeds, and the crumpled sheets

             From the bed of the wife.

Let them be symbols of human strife!

Give we God the dirt of the streets

Of our spirit, made mud with our tears,

The dust of our joys, the mire of our fears,

             And the rot of our life!