i have a hard time writing about memphis. it’s not that i have any problems conjuring up the memories, they are right there. when i think of memphis i think of cars pulled over on the road, homeless men, and death.

death is all around memphis. the ghosts haunt the streets. you can pay to see a deadman’s home. you can go see where a good man was shot and killed. memphis capitalizes on the death.

but that, that i could handle. because that’s why i went to memphis. i went to memphis to see the ghost of elvis, to look at his tacky things. i went to memphis to see where martin luther king, jr. was shot. i went to memphis because there was some part of me that wanted to see graceland.

what i didn’t plan on seeing was a woman drop dead just underneath the balcony where king was shot. that wasn’t in the price of admission. i didn’t pay to see this woman’s daughter drop to her knees and scream, “mama, mama, wake up mama. don’t do this mama, wake up.”

i didn’t come from minnesota to see the paramedics take the woman’s dentures from her mouth and toss them aside. that seems to be what i remember the most. the site of her dentures sitting on the carpet behind the paramedic’s foot. i just stared at her top teeth as they tried to breathe life into her chest.

and then they tried to usher us into the room to see where martin luther king, jr was standing when he got shot. and i couldn’t do it, so i left. and i walked across the street, to see where james earl ray was staying when he shot dr. king.

and i didn’t want to see that either. so i just sat on a bench and i cried. and the other people thought that maybe i was just overwhelmed by the emotion of it all, but i wasn’t. all i could hear was that woman crying for her mama.