North of Clarkesdale, up against the Mississippi River, at the scruffy edges of the state, you'll find Friar's Point.
It was after five Friday evening when I followed my colleague into town on what can barely be described as a lane. On one side over hanging tree limbs threaten to completely obscure the forward view...on the other, the fields grow menacingly close to the Purple, Baby Blue, Black and Maroon clapboard shacks.
The closeness breaks at the first intersection on an abandoned building that takes up almost an entire block. Through the vine choked cyclone fence you can see into shattered windows vegetation steadily at work reclaiming the plot...across the street, in a dirt yard sits an old black man in a rocking chair staring through a lazy eye at his fence. A six foot tall fence made of old vehicle and engine parts.
It shouldn't come as any great surprise that those desperate, threatening and disturbingly seductive sounds have roots in a place like Friar's Point.
The place isn't dead. Just before I took that photo a fresh-faced black teenage couple zoomed by on a four wheeler but, the constant presence of the levy reminds you that the town literally sits on the edge of disaster. The place is a material expression of fatalism...
Of course....
...every natural and unholy disaster from yankees to tornadoes have taken their shots at the town.
On the way out I passed two youngish black males having a lively discussion with a tiny southeast Asian woman sitting on a milk crate.
That's Friars Point...that's The Delta.
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