Dusting By Julia Alvarez

Each morning I wrote my name

on the dusty cabinet, then crossed

the dining room table in script, scrawled

in capitals on the backs of chairs,

practicing signatures like scales

A picture of Julia Alvarez~

while Mother followed, squirting

linseed from a burping can

into a crumpled-up flannel.

She erased my fingerprints

from the bookshelf and rocker,

polished mirrors on the desk

scribbled with my alphabets.

My name was swallowed in the towel

with which she jeweled the table tops.

The grain surfaced in the oak

and the pine grew luminous.

But I refused with every mark

to be like her, anonymous.

Dare to analyse it: 

In this poem, the persona clearly specifies her difference in character compared to her mother. “practicing signatures like scales” reflects the persona as an artistic and elegant individual which contrast the idea of her mother “followed, squirting linseed from a burping can into a crumpled-up flannel” which reflects her mother as a rather different style from her elegant impression. Therefore, stanza one reflects the artistic yet elegant persona’s difference from her mother, who really has no connection with her daughter’s way and style of life.

In the next stanza, “She erased my fingerprints from the bookshelf and rocker” and “But I refused with every mark to be like her, anonymous”. These suggests the way that the persona thinks of her mother, as someone that is “anonymous”, unknown to the world, transparent to people, and is firm that she does not want to end up like her mother, she wants to leave deep impressions on people and not be “anonymous” like her mother, be recognised by people.

This poem gets us to think about how the young us thinks and how we think nowadays. When we were young, we were almost not afraid to try on anything, and have dreams as wild and unique as possible. But as we grew, we started to understand the society and care about our image thus a lot of things we did not try for fear that will ruin our reputation or think that some things are just impossible to achieve. If we had the courage and ignorance of the young us, will the world, the society be a better place then?