Ghosts †Seeing is Believing :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay

Ghosts – Seeing is Believing   Ã‚  Ã‚  I live in a ghost hallway. They come and go whenever they want, like the transparent, blow-away wings of bees. Their spirits hover inside this house on Mechanic Street like a twilight hue filling a wine glass. I live more or less inside their moods, which they carry behind them in traces of light that flood the panes one window at a time and the creaky flutes of rusty hinges. The ghosts don't say â€Å"boo† and they don't swing chains. They're good ghosts as far as I can tell, calm as a cup of tea, considerate and watchful and able to pay attention to the least thing for many hours. I like how they watch me read without telling me what to think; I like how they touch my mind with ghost memories, laughing and smoking on the porch with their neighbors. I like how they stared out these same windows serious and alone in their own thoughts, unable to share with each other the deepest parts of themselves because the inner commotion was too great to put into words. I s ee how after a fight or death in the family they sat by themselves in the living room, wanting things to be good again, wanting to be healed but not being able to do anything but wait.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What they have left behind is shorn of all eventfulness as if what happened here long ago in this quasi-dilapidated shotgun house still lingers on as after-tone slowly turning into something else, the echo of their memories which I navigate now with a cup of coffee and a three-day beard. I'm doing a soft-shoe in my slippers through their long recollections, the fog that hangs in the trees between dreams. They heard the same front door whine and clatter and the soft thudding of footfalls on the sidewalk: they heard the wind in the trees and the wash of rain tearing through them on its way to another season carrying a hundred small deaths in its wake. Their senses are alive in mine, just as mine are remade in the memory of theirs. It's a mysterious transference that I do not understand. I don't necessarily like to feel the pangs of sorrow the woman felt that beetled up and down her spine like a slug of mercury, finding her defenseless in her own house at different times in her life, like a painful sickness that keeps coming back. Ghosts – Seeing is Believing :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay Ghosts – Seeing is Believing   Ã‚  Ã‚  I live in a ghost hallway. They come and go whenever they want, like the transparent, blow-away wings of bees. Their spirits hover inside this house on Mechanic Street like a twilight hue filling a wine glass. I live more or less inside their moods, which they carry behind them in traces of light that flood the panes one window at a time and the creaky flutes of rusty hinges. The ghosts don't say â€Å"boo† and they don't swing chains. They're good ghosts as far as I can tell, calm as a cup of tea, considerate and watchful and able to pay attention to the least thing for many hours. I like how they watch me read without telling me what to think; I like how they touch my mind with ghost memories, laughing and smoking on the porch with their neighbors. I like how they stared out these same windows serious and alone in their own thoughts, unable to share with each other the deepest parts of themselves because the inner commotion was too great to put into words. I s ee how after a fight or death in the family they sat by themselves in the living room, wanting things to be good again, wanting to be healed but not being able to do anything but wait.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  What they have left behind is shorn of all eventfulness as if what happened here long ago in this quasi-dilapidated shotgun house still lingers on as after-tone slowly turning into something else, the echo of their memories which I navigate now with a cup of coffee and a three-day beard. I'm doing a soft-shoe in my slippers through their long recollections, the fog that hangs in the trees between dreams. They heard the same front door whine and clatter and the soft thudding of footfalls on the sidewalk: they heard the wind in the trees and the wash of rain tearing through them on its way to another season carrying a hundred small deaths in its wake. Their senses are alive in mine, just as mine are remade in the memory of theirs. It's a mysterious transference that I do not understand. I don't necessarily like to feel the pangs of sorrow the woman felt that beetled up and down her spine like a slug of mercury, finding her defenseless in her own house at different times in her life, like a painful sickness that keeps coming back.