The Haunting of Lake Lanier

8-word prompt: recall, urge, mouth, abundant, worship, medicine, sordid, water.

They pretend not to recall
the tragedy they buried under the water.
Rather, they succumb to the urge
to frolic and play on the surface;
on the mouth of the lake,
where boats are abundant,
they find value only in the worship of the sun.
It is their medicine against the doldrums of summer,
at the expense of the sordid details
of the lives lost underneath the waves,
of the town demolished in this man-made lake.

But the black spirits long buried beneath
do not forget.
Restless in its murky depths,
they unsettle the water,
snatching victims,
and pulling them under.
Would that they can make them see,
be a witness to a town that was,
find a remnant of a life on a precipice
of greatness—
but they never see,
and they refuse to witness.
So the spirits swim in perpetuity,
disrupting the peace,
bringing disquiet,
seeking revenge and upending lives.

*Please note: The area now covered by Lake Lanier was once home to the town of Oscarville. This was a Black community established during the Reconstruction era, but its residents were driven out by racial violence in the early 1900s. When the lake was formed, the town and its history were submerged.
As a result, the history of the town of Oscarville is a significant part of the lake's backstory, and its submersion has contributed to many local legends and ghost stories about the lake, particularly the high number of drownings that have occurred there. The submerged town and its structures, along with tall trees, are considered navigation hazards.