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tumblehawk's review against another edition
Mystical and mysterious little chapbook containing a long 3-part essay that explores a body’s relationship to the illness that haunts it, and how that ties to ideas of home and belonging and history. Can’t rate it yet, cuz I feel like I need to reread it. Definitely enjoyed it but found it hard to penetrate at times.
katherine_elizab's review against another edition
5.0
As I read Ghost/Home by Dennis Sweeney, I felt a chill of recognition. I read this line: "The apartment crushed me into staying in it, even though leaving--the cool sun and autumn air--is what would have held the ghost at bay." It made me think about places I've been and lived that have felt undeniably haunted. There was the Victorian apartment in San Francisco with the original gas lamps and bay windows, little white cherubs carved into the crown molding. Each night I woke up at around 3am, and felt a presence sitting on the edge of my bed. One night the power went out and my roommates and I sat in the living room, a candle between us. Each of us had felt that presence, independently. It wasn't menacing but it was palpable. As I lived in that apartment, my own hauntings started to take residence and I felt them crowding me, pushing me, preventing me from leaving.
There is something in Sweeney's porousness that makes him a target for ghosts. He writes about the particular spirit of his city:
"Where no one believes in ghosts, there is no room for them. Hyper-rational joie de vivre is the newest technology for driving out ghosts and Denver is a hub of it insofar as the city is populated by an endless influx of people devoted to hiking and climbing and craft beer. No one comes for spirit. Spirit can't be named, so those who need names for everything do not seek it. In this way the nameless is crowded out. It looks for a home until it finds someone like us."
I felt such kinship with this passage, and the way that Sweeney feels attuned to that bit of spirit that can't be seen, or defined, or rationalized. Of course a ghost looks for a home in someone that will believe in it. Of course that person would be naturally porous, open, and seeking. And it is up to those of us who are porous to create space for ghosts, to not deny them, to allow ourselves to be haunted, in a way.
There is something in Sweeney's porousness that makes him a target for ghosts. He writes about the particular spirit of his city:
"Where no one believes in ghosts, there is no room for them. Hyper-rational joie de vivre is the newest technology for driving out ghosts and Denver is a hub of it insofar as the city is populated by an endless influx of people devoted to hiking and climbing and craft beer. No one comes for spirit. Spirit can't be named, so those who need names for everything do not seek it. In this way the nameless is crowded out. It looks for a home until it finds someone like us."
I felt such kinship with this passage, and the way that Sweeney feels attuned to that bit of spirit that can't be seen, or defined, or rationalized. Of course a ghost looks for a home in someone that will believe in it. Of course that person would be naturally porous, open, and seeking. And it is up to those of us who are porous to create space for ghosts, to not deny them, to allow ourselves to be haunted, in a way.
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