Poetry: 'Dust!' A poem about Black Lung Disease with lung picture
Coal Worker's Pneumoconiosis (Black Lung Disease)
Coal Worker's Pneumoconiosis (CWP) is also known as Anthracosis, or Black Lung Disease. It is an affliction generally caused by inhalation of small amounts of coal dust over many years working within the coal industry. The disease is much less prevelant these days due to improvements in equipment and working conditions.
The main symptoms are a shortness of breath caused by deposits of coal dust in the lungs. This in turn often leads to heart failure and emphysema. Retired coal workers are far better respected now than in earlier times, and many now qualify for good pensions, although this is probably small recompense for those afflicted with Black Lung Disease, which is often long-term and incurable.
Dust! (Black Lung Disease)
Breath In, Breathe deep
Day turns into night
And night into day
Underground
Cough, cough
The air is like treacle
So thick with coal dust
Coal is related to diamonds
So they say
So they say
Perhaps we are filling
Our chests with treasure
Like Long John Silver
But Blind Pugh was not
The only man
With a black spot
Our lungs are silted up
Like a river on go-slow
Oxygen seeps in tiny increments
Through our air-ways
While we gasp and flounder
Like beached fish
Black lung disease they call it
We get a pension now
If you shone a torch
Into our lungs
Do you think they would glisten
Like black diamonds?