“Memories,” by Barbara Streisand, is one my favorite songs. I love the lyrics:

Memories
Light the corners of my mind
Misty watercolor memories
Of the way we were
Scattered pictures
Of the times we left behind
Smiles we gave to one another
For the way we were

Can it be that it was all so simple then
Or has time rewritten every line
If we had the chance to do it all again
Tell me — Would we? Could we?…

In the blog I previously posted there are those scattered pictures. There’s this picture of me at 8, and I write about this because at 8 I have my first “political memory.” I remember the death of Martin Luther King., Jr. in 1968. I don’t remember the death of Robert F. Kennedy, Malcolm X or John F. Kennedy, but I remember the King’s. The year, 1968, part of what one historian has called the Decisive Decade, was a decade of Death.

In researching my roots, I have also searched the corridors in my mind, tapping into memories. What I know is that we all experience the same event differently, that is, our response to the event. With Dr. King, for the first time in my life that I can recall, the earth moved. I knew that something monumental had happened, something that would change the world, even though I didn’t understand it. Later, in poetic form, I would capture these memories in my epic poem, Black Shadows and Through the White Looking Glass: Remembrance of Things Past and Present.

Twelve years ago I began writing notes for a memoir. Scattered pictures have memories flooding my mind. I have to revisit and get to writing or….