Peace, Brother
I could blame it on growing old, but I know it's not, not really. I've seen them all my life, seen these ghosts. Not jumping out to spook me, just watching me like children in the corner. I think I left San Francisco because I was tired of their shenanigans. I wanted to be someplace new and clean and free of ghosts. Now they haunt my second home New Jersey, too.
Some places are more ghostly than others though, like the corner of Seventh and Judah Street in San Francisco. I cannot walk past that corner without seeing Solveig coming out the door with 'Ban The Bomb' placards and banners for the demonstration. She might as well wave at me, but she never does. Or seeing Peter Weiss swinging over the rail of the entry stairs onto the shoulders of one of the teenagers who are crashing our big peacenik party. And whomping on him in peacenik joy. Or seeing Margarita emerge from the front archway wearing long braids, my Mexican chaleca and her brassy confident smile.
Who were these people, man? Were they always ghosts? Were they really real once? Is this all a dream?
I wish it wasn't so gray in Spokane. Grey skies, gray ice down the sidewalk, gray homeless hearts standing aimless forever in the skid row doorways on Third Avenue.
Some places are more ghostly than others though, like the corner of Seventh and Judah Street in San Francisco. I cannot walk past that corner without seeing Solveig coming out the door with 'Ban The Bomb' placards and banners for the demonstration. She might as well wave at me, but she never does. Or seeing Peter Weiss swinging over the rail of the entry stairs onto the shoulders of one of the teenagers who are crashing our big peacenik party. And whomping on him in peacenik joy. Or seeing Margarita emerge from the front archway wearing long braids, my Mexican chaleca and her brassy confident smile.
Who were these people, man? Were they always ghosts? Were they really real once? Is this all a dream?
I wish it wasn't so gray in Spokane. Grey skies, gray ice down the sidewalk, gray homeless hearts standing aimless forever in the skid row doorways on Third Avenue.
Labels: Looking Into The Past, San Francisco
posted by Christopher Newton at 10:30 AM
1 Comments:
Those beloved reminders of our mortality sometimes seem to return at opportune times, like when birthdays approach or something jars our steel-trap (though sometimes rusty) memories.
More often than not, though, they are always there. They are a part of us, far too etched into our souls to ever be left behind. Wherever we go, we are still there and they are with us. What would we be without them?
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