House of Dust:  A Symphony
Author: first_name: Conrad
last_name: Aiken
Language: English
Year: 1920

The House of Dust is a poem written in the four-movement format of a classical symphony.  Hauntingly beautiful despite its bleak post-World War I depictions of human mortality and loss, the poem develops its movements around central images such as Japanese ukiyo-e ("floating world") woodblock prints, touching the reader's senses with endlessly evocative allusions to wind, sea, and weather.  In this underlying Japanese sensibility and dependence on central perceptual images, Aiken's poem is simil