The Ghosts Are Being Driven Out
I’m working on an essay that I hoped to publish this week, but it’s turning into a bigger beastie than I thought. I’m still receiving new fibers that want to be woven in…so it’s telling me that there’s more to listen to before it can be finished.
So, this week, I am offering a couple of poems with photographic accompaniment that I wrote about Charleston, my former home of 17 years. They are mourning poems, really. When I moved to Charleston in 2005, I spent hours wandering the streets and alleyways, picking out my favorite houses (always the somewhat neglected ones—decayed grandeur is my weakness), discovering and exploring all the secrets of this sleepy port city. I would walk by the home where my great-great-grandfather lived, where my grandmother visited as a child, and dream of buying it and turning it back into a home (financial barriers seem like nothing when you are 18 and the economy hasn’t collapsed yet). It was a place full of mysteries and secrets.
As more people and money flowed in, the crowded sidewalks no longer lent themselves to meandering adventures. The old, strange little shops were devoured by developers and their municipal cronies. The houses were renovated within an inch of their lives, gutted like fish.
In 2020, I remember reading stories from New Yorkers, talking about how eerie it was to be in a New York City that felt entirely unfamiliar. This quote stuck with me: “It is a uniquely strange feeling to miss the place where you are,” because it resonated so deeply with how I had felt about Charleston for years.
People often ask if I miss Charleston. I do—but it’s not because I moved away. I missed it for such a long time before I left: the sense that there were still secrets to discover, my coterie of fellow artistic weirdos, and the feeling of possibility—these had all slowly evaporated over the years.
The ghosts are being driven out
You used to feel them
on a hot noon day,
peering out from behind black shutters
in cool, deep houses
The heavy silence
when you know you’re being watched
Then they came
armed with fresh paint
and the latest trends
A 60” television
to make sure there was no peace
Security systems
so no one could approach unseen
I no longer feel the ghosts
keeping their silent vigil
The people have no space for them
for they are not in fashion
-March 2021
I’ve mourned it all, a hundred times.
(The ghosts are being driven out)
Going over every familiar mile in my mind.
Do I need to trace each path, back to the beginning?
The is the last time I leave.
But it’s all been lost to me before now.
So much lives only in my memory—
A hazy dreamworld
Of people and places,
vanished
Though perhaps the shell remains.
The same could be said of me.
-October 2022
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