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Bodie

The whistled whispers of a desert wind
Drift through the dusty streets and haunted halls
Where faded lives of those who loved and sinned
Now flicker-flit like shadows on the walls.

Unhinged, once swinging doors lie on the floor
Of the saloon where ghosts of miners, dry
And dead as tumbleweeds cry, “Nevermore,”
Beneath the silence of a high-noon sky.

A school with broken desks and fallen slate;
An empty church, its single pew askew,
Bear witness to how tides of time and fate
Reduce to sepia, what once seemed new.

Like ghosts, we too will one day be a blur
When “is” and “are” become what “was” and “were.”

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Bodie: an abandoned mining community, now a State Park ghost town in a remote, high desert corner of eastern California near the Nevada border.  

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James A. Tweedie is a retired pastor living in Long Beach, Washington. He has written and published six novels, one collection of short stories, and four collections of poetry including Sidekicks, Mostly Sonnets, and Laughing Matters, all with Dunecrest Press. His poems have been published nationally and internationally in both print and online media. He was honored with being chosen as the winner of the 2021 SCP International Poetry Competition.

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13 Responses

  1. Roy Eugene Peterson

    James, you beautifully captured the essence and melancholy feel of a ghost town. The ones I remember were in Arizona. The use of sepia is so fitting. Mortality reflections enter the mind as one contemplates the fleeting passage of time. Great sonnet that took me back in time and made me look at life passing by once again.

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      Roy, I think in a successful poem word associations and tapping into common memories is perhaps as important or even more important to its success than rhyme and meter alone.

      Which reminds me when I was last in Bodie with my brother, he said he felt as if the place was haunted. I said that if a specter appeared and you could see through it, then all was well. Why is that? he asked. Because, I answered, it means the ghost is clear.

      Happy 4th.

      Reply
  2. Mark Stellinga

    James — What “was” before “is” now no more, as well you here convey, and what they “are” compared to “were”‘, I’m very sad to say, is now, too often, very sad to see. 🙁 An excellent and thought provoking sonnet – 🙂

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      Mark,
      I love it when I am blessed with a comment that is both a compliment and a poem in its own right! Thanks for both!

      Reply
  3. Joseph S. Salemi

    It reminds me of the Anglo-Saxon poem “The Ruin,” although this one, in sonnet form, is more concentrated and intense.

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      The exquisite brilliance of poetry when it creates one thing that brings to mind another.

      Reply
  4. Margaret Brinton

    A beautiful poem. I have been on the back roads between San Diego and Lake Tahoe more than once, and there are many other areas which are also remote and deserted and lonely.

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      Margaret,

      What you say is very true. I will be driving, hiking and fly fishing in some of those areas this coming August—particularly in the area above and around Tioga Pass, the 10,000 ft eastern entrance to Yosemite National Park.

      Reply
      • Margaret Brinton

        How enviable, James! The meadows and streams below Tioga Pass are so magnificent!

  5. Gigi Ryan

    Dear James,
    How clever that ghosts of miners in the saloon are now “dry,” and that the single pew is a “witness.”
    My favorite line is – When “is” and “are” become what “was” and “were.”
    Bodie is now on my list of places to visit someday. I love state and national parks.
    Gigi

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      Gigi, you have a marvelous wit about you and I believe you would very much enjoy a visit to Bodie! Thanks for the comment

      Reply
  6. Cynthia L Erlandson

    James, you have managed to put into words the universal thoughts and feelings people have when seeing a ghost town. Faded lives flitting like shadows; ghosts dead as tumbleweeds saying “Nevermore!”; and especially your last line, are profound images with which the reader identifies, having had these thoughts in inarticulate form.

    Reply
    • James A. Tweedie

      Thank you, Cynthia. You touch on an important point insofar as poetry, at its best, articulates what can in no other way be articulated. This is, I think, the essence of all art. I’m glad you found some of that in my poem.

      Reply

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