Goofer Dust is a very old African-American hoodoo curio used to trouble, harm, or kill an enemy. In particular, it can cause the victim's legs to swell up and medical doctors will not be able to effect a cure. Recipes for making it vary, but it is almost always a mixture of simple natural ingredients, usually including Graveyard Dirt, powdered sulphur (which can give it a yellowish colour) and salt. Subsidiary ingredients may include powdered snake heads or snake skin "sheds," red pepper, black pepper, powdered bones, powdered insects or snails, and greyish, powdery-surfaced herbs such as mullein and sage. In the past, some formulas for Goofer Dust included anvil dust, the fine black iron detritus found around a blacksmith's anvil. A modern substitute for this now-uncommon ingredient would be magnetic sand, which is also black in colour.
When a victim is goofered, a number of things can happen. The victim may start having bad luck, lose his or her job, suffer from sexual impotence or mental confusion, or develop a chronic disease such as tuberculosis, diabetes, angina, gout, or high blood pressure. Of all of these problems, the relationship between goofering and diabetes is the clearest and most direct: the symptoms of poisoning through the feet are identical with those of diabetic edema and diabetic neuropathy.
One of the first signs of leg-centered or "classic" goofering is a sharp pain in the feet or legs. This is followed by swelling and an inability to walk. A really severe case of poisoning will leave the victim crawling around on all fours and howling like a dog. Medical doctors may provide palliative relief, but they can't really help a person who has been goofered. Unless the victim is cured by a root doctor, death may result.
