The Ghosts That Still Haunt Me

“Frequently, things that haunt us are ambiguous. Confusing. They cause unrest. Once we write about them, however, we fathom their inner secrets… and our own.” – Sue William Silverman

Every time I blink, it’s like a pulse of electricity surges from the back of my eyes to the image center of my brain. I hear a buzzing crack of energy, like something out of Dr. Fankenstein’s lab, as the muted images that haunt my thoughts in lonely moments try to reanimate themselves in my conscious thoughts. I can’t quite make out their faces, but I still see them. Occasionally, the flashing stops and a single face comes into focus. Her face. The face of a mother whose infant son died suddenly, without cause. Her eyes roll back, and her chin bobs against her chest. Her neck falls limp as the weight of her grief is more than it can bear. She’s a real person, but her memory is more of an archetype of trauma to me. Hers is the face I see when my scars come close to the surface. Hers is the face I saw every time I blinked early last week. She is all the faces I’ve forgotten but whose ghosts still haunt my dreams. She is every name I can’t remember or never knew. I lived in close proximity to trauma and death for four years, serving as a hospital chaplain. I wouldn’t trade that time for anything. The work felt purposeful and needed, AND  I’m not sure I’ll ever fully recover. So, I write. I write to find peace amid the haunting. I write to acknowledge what my trauma, vicarious as it is, wants for and from me. I don’t write to dwell on what has been or to drudge up a painful past. I write to heal. I write to actively participate in my healing and accompany other people in theirs. 

The ghosts still haunt me, and I’m healing all the same.