Mike Wilson :: Choice ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I grew up in Lexington, Kentucky. My father grew up in Strawberry Holler, Wayne County, Kentucky. My mother’s father was a coal miner in Eastern Kentucky. Neither of them were much on church, but going was part...
Tracie Adams :: I Guess We’ll Never Know ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: When I let my dogs out in the morning, I’m rewarded with a picturesque view of rolling hills, pastures dotted with horses and a tiny mule. The goats bleat at me incessantly and I don’t mind. On...
Brandon Yu :: Blessings in Disguise ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Some people think Florida doesn’t count as the South, but I beg to differ. The heat, Spanish moss, and help-yourself attitude of everyone here in Tampa– many of whom hail from Alabama or Georgia– have made this...
Anna Davis-Abel :: Southern Sweet Tea ::
Southern legitimacy statement– The South is inextricable from me as my bones. I was born in Mississippi to two families that traced their lineages to poor antebellum share croppers and then grew up in Alabama. I left the south for...
Eric Olsen :: Life, Legacy, Fractured Spines, and the Power of Now ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I am a grits, sweet tea, and collards enthusiast. I have a recipe for each that I make myself regularly. *ya’ll need to read this essay.. Life, Legacy, Fractured Spines, and the Power of Now April 13,...
Barry Gordon Thompson-Cook :: It Was On a Bayou ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Barry Gordon Thompson-Cook was born in Louisiana and is buried there. In between, he lived in Dallas, Omaha before moving back to Louisiana. He left his beloved Opelousas to marry a Yankee, to the horror of his...
Jen Aceto :: I Found Ease in Oklahoma ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Despite being born and raised on the coast, I felt most at home among the art deco buildings of downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma. I’ve participated in a number of debates about whether Oklahoma is in the South or...
Hampton D Harmon :: The Cast of the Murdaugh Saga ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I am from the “salt water south” near Myrtle Beach, where we make taffy from ocean water and moss creates shadows on moonlit walks with friends and lovers. I spent my summers barefoot both in the yard...
Marsha Owens :: As Though We Had Choices ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Born in Richmond, VA, I’ve made it my forever home. My paternal grandpa was a waterman on the Chesapeake Bay, and to this day, I’m a seafood snob. I married an ex-Amishman to whom all things Southern...
Jim Hinson :: Tomato Sandwich Fantasies in Mid-November ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I grew up kicking the 2 inches of pink dust that is formed when the characteristic red clay of the Carolina Piedmont is subjected to a long summer’s baking. Until I was eighteen, I lived in the...
Donna Harlan :: Everybody Has a Snowman Story ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I grew up in the foothills of East Tennessee, and honestly wasn’t always proud of it, knowing that others thought we didn’t wear shoes (never mind that I enjoyed being barefoot and still do). In college I...
Kelsey Erica Tran :: The True Meaning of Culture ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Growing up in Maryland, I got to experience summer bbqs and grilling burgers during the Fourth of July. Urban barbecue was a local chain that reminds me of my childhood. After taking swimming lessons during the summer,...
Ted Harrison :: This Year a Kayak ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I am born and bred in the South and I have been fortunate to have some of my scribbling published in this journal. In the past I have written of my attempts to pick cotton on my...
Kyla Houbolt :: Where We Went ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Once, near the coast of NC, (where I was born and raised) I watched a man wheel the entire carcass of a frozen dead pig into the front door of the Piggly Wiggly. I guess it was...
David Grubb :: The Rodent Queen of Half Dome ::
Southern Bona Fide I’m still a bonafide southern fried hunting and fishing machine. I’ve gotten up before dawn and bagged an 8’ gator, went right up to dusk to put an arrow in the heart of a tusky razorback, and...
Nora Super :: Brains vs. Beauty ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, I moved to Washington, DC, right out of college to try to change the world. When I left New Orleans, I rejected the party culture: full of festivals, jazz music,...
Harry Neil :: We Discover Cottage Cheese ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born in a very rural part of North Carolina’s Cape Fear Basin. My grade school was part of Penderlea, “America’s first farm city,” a depression-era homesteading project that ultimately failed. I went on to the...
R. L. Frazier :: Timmy ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I grew up in a part of Oklahoma known as Little Dixie. I don’t consider Oklahoma to be in the Deep South any more than you do, but I believe most Oklahomans to be Southerners – the...
Matthew Bearden :: A Trip Through God’s Country ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born and raised in Palestine, Texas. I carry it with me. I may be a pro-choice, non-southern baptist, resident of Wisconsin, but I am still a Texan! I’ll be thankin’ of all y’all when I...
Ashley Elizabeth Hewitt :: Woodsia Lane ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: Born in Jackson, Mississippi, I attended Millsaps College and more recently completed my MFA in Creative Writing at the Mississippi University for Women. I have lived in New Orleans for twenty years but built a log cabin...
Rory Squires :: A Love Letter to Humanity ::
SLS: My mother’s extended family originated in West Virginia, so half of the family has accents. While I live in Pennsylvania, I can still point out and label the southern states, and I adore the Waffle House. *Ya’ll need to...
Kayla Branstetter :: Changing Directions ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: On your website, you stated “Let the bitter past be studied–not re-lived.” “Changing Directions” mirrors that southern attitude because Tony allowed me to interview her about her bitter past for others to study in hopes they will...
Cynthia Gilmore :: My Boobs at Sixty ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I moved south kicking and screaming in 2015 with my partner, a leg man. He stalks women on the balmy South Carolina coast where I left him, while I’ve made a peaceful home in the mountains of...
David VanDevelder :: A Requiem for Grandmother Tree ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: We were a prototypical southern nuclear family. My Papaw came up in the Great Smokey Mountains, near Farner, Tennessee and Cherokee, North Carolina. When he was nine, he lost track of the time one summer evening, squirrel...
Jessica Pisano :: Hometown Lies ::
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born in Jacksonville, Florida, have lived in Asheville, North Carolina, for over thirty years, and feel most at home on the Tybee Island beach. Hometown Lies “No soy de Miami, pero mi abuela es de...
Poetry
Essays
