When There Were Ghosts

Cigarette smoke is the way ghosts enter the poem. As the way that ghosts enter the world of the living, smoke symbolizes a bridge. The word “smoke” appears in Lines 3, 5, 16, and 21. It is also referred to as “wavering mist of the cigarettes” (Line 8). Smoke and mists are insubstantial, like ghosts, and these memories carry with them emotions and nostalgia, just like the smoke carried the images of the movies so many decades ago.

In the poem, stars first refer to movie stars, but the motif of stars develops the theme of Blended Identity when the speaker describes how the smoke distorts the images of “María Félix and Pedro Armendáriz” (Line 17) just enough that they begin to resemble his “aunt and one of my uncles” (Line 18). This allows the audience of the movie to feel like they are “the story and the stuff and the stars” (Line 23). The smoke highlights how characters are symbolic representations of moviegoers. Blended Identity, as the stars projected on screen and smoke, heightens the experience of going to the movies by offering a sense of inclusion and collectivity.

Using the term stars, in addition to actors, also makes the reader think about celestial bodies.