Southern Expressions

Long shadows sweep across the bayou
Whispers of birch trees in the wind
Lonely sounds of cicadas
Resonances of the living now subdued, within

In front of a large plantation home, stands he
Now old, paint chipped, as if standing in the mist
Nothing here feels too real
but the whispers of ghosts in the midsummer’s heat
Spirits of yesteryear lingering on, not moving
Trapped in imaginations of the ‘glory’ days of theirs

A grandson of the South, is he, though a stranger to it all
Difficult to feel the present moment, finds he
Noting echoes of the past to be more vivid
If not only in his mind’s eye
than the present day.

Feeling as if he pays attention well
he might by privy to the parties of grandeur;
Ladies in ball gown finery,
delicate lace fans in ivory hands
Tittering charmingly at gentlemen’s words
Men dressed smartly, proud;
Gliding about the veranda and in the rooms within
Violins waxing elegant in the background
Such pretty images laid against unforgiving realities
Of a different kind of setting
Realities of harsher lives of others
One’s luxury built upon the back of another

Severe as the sentiment might be
Upon which such vivid judgment lays
Here remains the vestiges of his family,
A remnance of the South, now gone, obsolete
Our onlooker, son of this upbringing, the South in his blood
Fails to dig up too much hatred or distaste
But rather an enormous sensation of sadness and pity
Pitying a useless, meaningless conceit

As evening colors the shadows black,
as yet another day dies and is gone;
our young man reaches down for a valise
with one last glance at the scene before him,
Then turns, headed toward the train station
and beyond there to the hustle and bustle of his
current city in the North.
The place he now calls home.