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Stories

Virginia poet Sharon Ackerman's Appalachian verses capture Carolina wrens, bloodwort meadows, and climate change in evocative poetry that bridges generations and landscapes.

The Berry Behind the Brambles

Ackerman’s verses—rich in the landscapes of the Blue Ridge—bridge our generations, from a rickety shelf stacked with jelly jars to climate-anxious meadows.

Escape Into Mayhem

Two Georgia promoters combine punk rock and pro wrestling to create a close-quarters blend of two slam-bang art forms. And yes, art is the right word.

Ten-Year-Old Boy Ponders Heaven and Hell

When we were kids, understanding the afterlife was confusing and frightening. A Southern writer gets inside the head of a boy who’s scared plumb to death.

Some Things, You Will Never Know

What we want to believe about our ancestors and what we believed as children pose questions that may never have answers.

Silent but Certain Agreement

A North Carolina poet fills her verses with memories and observations that flow from the present day back into the years passed and gone.

Pour My Breath Into You

In West Virginia, the state with the nation’s highest rate of death by overdose, faith communities answer urgent callings from any and all.

The Widow, the House, the Porch and the Stars

A Kentucky poet explores who we are, the places we inhabit and the skies that shimmer above us.

The Saw and the Sawdust

He restored an old mountain cabin, wrote a sonnet to an old man and fell asleep, missing the sounds of the whippoorwill.

Tennessee Poems

She moved from the mountains of Germany’s Black Forest to the mountains of Tennessee. Her welcome there felt like divine intervention.

How to Pluck the Hell out of a Heart

No mother tongue is as rich as the Southern one. Our words are musical, and poetry expresses them with soul-shaking force. Annie Woodford celebrates the songs we say.

Seasons

When the bulldozers topple the trees and the owls and the field mice and the feral cats are gone, who will remember?

Change of Heart

Three verses that take us from the gorges of western North Carolina to that mess on the front porch.

The Songs We Say

Salvation South kicks off a month-long celebration of Southern poetry with a soaring essay from Annie Woodford.