"All the dust throughout the land of Egypt became lice."
"If you refuse to let them go, I will bring locusts into your country tomorrow. They will cover the face of the ground so that it cannot be seen. They will devour what little you have left after the hail, including every tree that is growing in your fields. They will fill your houses and those of all your officials and all the Egyptians—something neither your fathers nor your forefathers have ever seen from the day they settled in this land till now."
— Moses and Aaron (speaking for God), The Bible, The Book Of Exodus
"I send the locusts on the wind
Such as the world has never seen
On ev'ry leaf, on ev'ry stalk
Until there's nothing left of green
I send My scourge, I send My sword,
Thus saith the Lord!"
Such as the world has never seen
On ev'ry leaf, on ev'ry stalk
Until there's nothing left of green
I send My scourge, I send My sword,
Thus saith the Lord!"
— Chorus, The Prince of Egypt
"Oh, my God! Bees! Bees! Millions of bees!"
— Helicopter Pilot, The Swarm (1978)
"Forming clouds
Their shadow shrouds
Louder the tattered wings they sound
Descending...
DOWN! THEY COME!
THE SWARM OF LOCUST!
SKIES! ABOVE!
CONVERGE TO CHOKE US!
FEAST! OF SOULS!
CONSUME THE HARVEST!
YOUNG! AND OLD!
SUFFER UNTO THE LOCUST!"
Their shadow shrouds
Louder the tattered wings they sound
Descending...
DOWN! THEY COME!
THE SWARM OF LOCUST!
SKIES! ABOVE!
CONVERGE TO CHOKE US!
FEAST! OF SOULS!
CONSUME THE HARVEST!
YOUNG! AND OLD!
SUFFER UNTO THE LOCUST!"
— Machine Head, "Locust"
They grow like a dark cloud on the horizon and the horses shy and the men reach for their guns but they are useless. The insects swarm over them blindly, as if the men and horses do not exist, are a figment of a locust god's imagination. They enter their hair and their clothes and their mouths and their noses and the horses rear, frightened, and the men curse and one of them cries out loudly and there is the smell of human piss and a dark trickle on the ground. The insects swarm over them and they bat at them helplessly and Aaron roars, ordering them to turn, but the tide of black insects pushes them this way and that and he can no longer see the others in that sudden darkness, that blotting of the sun. At last he finds shelter against a rock face and watches the locusts swarm past until they are gone and a great darkness descends and where there were trees and fruit there is nothing but bare skeletons, and they drift along the road towards the fields and forests of the north.
—Locusts, by Lavie Tidhar
"Oh no, no, not the bees! NOT THE BEES!! AAAAAAAAARRRGH! OH, THEY'RE IN MY EYES! MYYYYY EYES! AAAAHHHHH! AAAAAGGHHH!"
— Edward Malus, The Wicker Man (2006)
