Dust coats everything here

Dust coats everything here, relentlessly. Dust seeps in through cracks. Through opened windows covered with simple wire screens. My clothes are more brown than any other color. As I walk the streets they turn from white to brown. I put them in the water to be washed but then they are hung upon the line and the dust swirls about happy to resettle on the shirt I just tried to rid it of. I wipe the windows free of dust but within an hour they are coated once again. I try to sweep the carpet removing a layer of dust but the carpet will never be clean. A simple broom is no combatant for the dust army. The dust knows that it is the true ruler of Nazret, Ethiopia. Those who try to argue with it only miss out in the end as the dust returns to claim the place. You can try to keep it at bay by closing doors and windows. By removing your shoes when entering the rooms but some how the dust creeps back in. Dust and cockroaches are every where. I wonder if one creates the other. Does the cockroach arise out of the dust or the dust from the cockroach. I am pretty sure it is the cockroach that arises out of the dust.

I imagine that the food is flavored in dust but I am so accustomed to it I no longer notice. I may think my feet are clean but when I dip them in water the water quickly turns brown. I have forgotten what true white looks like. I am coming to appreciate the color brown. There is nothing more attractive than brown even white must have a touch of brown to be a truly beautiful color. Dust covers my arms massaging them gently. My hair becomes coarse as the dust entertwines around each strand deepening the brown. My make up will soon become obsolete as the dust will hide the blemishes on my face and make me beautiful and slightly brown. I could wash my shoes four times a day and still they would turn grey from all the dust.

Keeping clean is useless, it can’t be done. Oddly enough we still try. We wash daily. We send our clothes to be washed. We use the dusty broom to remove the dust from the floors. We wash ourselves and our possessions. And we do make some difference by decreasing the amount of dust. To dust we will return.