Tag: Charleston

Goodbye Colubmia

To those who feel wronged by the Confederate flag lowering tomorrow take heart. Those of us for lowering the flag know that the minimum death toll of the American Civil War was 625,000. It was quite possibly 1,000,000. There were bastards, hero’s, no accounts, saints and sinners on both sides. The wrong side of history has room for many. There is one important fact we definitely know. We know that every death on both sides lead to Emancipation. Emancipation is the moment this nation began. Every sacrifice on both sides is remembered. It gave birth to anything great we are or will become. Our nation is the sons and daughters of Confederates, Unionists, Immigrants and Slaves. When our greatest sin ended we all began. Grace to all who made Emancipation possible. It is not forgotten.

Gene G. McLaughlin 2015

Charleston Dancer

You were always so elegant

Moving in ways

That I could barely comprehend

That I could never hope to replicate

Always seeming to understand what movement

Meant what to who

I never knew the code

Knowing of the structures

Society and the latest dances

For my feet would never learn the steps

You made bowling seem like ballet

Conversation a form of art

You made banter seem like diplomacy

An actor always knows their part

The world you knew is gone now

Echoes now only remain

The song slowed ended

With the last fading refrain.

Mills Brothers no longer on the radio

A time I never knew

Murrow no longer on the radio

The war is finally through

Gene G. McLaughlin 2013