Southern Legitimacy Statement: Native to Virginia and long-resident in Georgia, I’m as Southern as Southern can be. (Let’s not talk about the seven-year stretch in New Jersey.) A prominent Mid-Western poet once told me during a workshop, “I could listen to you read the phone book.” Three Poems Idlewild The…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born in the south; the south of Nicosia, Cyprus. Intercommunal conflict has marked my birth place as the last divided capital in the world. Growing up, I was not permitted to cross to the other side of my city. Since the opening of the border…

My Southern Legitimacy Statement follows: My mother had me in a Baptist hospital in Knoxville, Tennessee, and my father almost missed my birth because he was watching the Andy Griffith Show. I was raised in a house that had a creek in the backyard and a picture of Elvis on…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I am not born and bred but I have lived in the South–and if being an authentic individual is what the South is about–then I am Southern. Also, my son was born about as deep down as you can get and still be in America. Down Here…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Jeff is a musician, educator, and author from Huntsville, AL. He enjoys time alone to think and pursue creative projects, but not as much as he enjoys a good cup of coffee with his wife, Amy. The Writer’s Poem I don’t want to work tonight I’d rather…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: John Dorroh’s Irish ancestors reached the shores of South Carolina a few hundred years ago, and began migrating to the west and south. County Antrim is well-represented by the Dorroh lineage. After traveling the world as an army brat, Dorroh spent most of his life in Columbus,…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I fear that my complete listing of southern legitimacy would crash the cosmos & petunias so I shall HENCEFORTHWITH condense – I was born a coal miner’s son in the coal hollers of southwestern Virginia & as a child my family like many poor Appalachians migrated to…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: All you had to say was, “we don’t recommend you submit,” so I am submitting. Such is my legitimacy … Two Poems COOL JOHN FERGUSON He plays the requisite R&B, ballad, samba, smooth jazz, the pop tune all blued up then slowly ascends from the padded office…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Paula Kaufman hails from the only state entirely in the Appalachian Mountains. She likes homemade jam, local honey, black licorice laces, her grandma’s meringues and other sweetness. 21st Century Asking the Stars Advice Pea tendrils don’t know where to land, but always rise up. And the morning…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: My wife was born in Little Rock, AR. We’ve made our home there for the past two years. Three Poems AT LAST she stands in the upstairs window framed in stone choker chain around her neck stares across the water over the rolling knoll through the forest…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Chris Jansen is a former heroin addict. He lives in Athens, Georgia, where he teaches fitness boxing and cares for a disinterested guinea pig named Poozybear. If You Want to Know the Truth If You Want to Know the Truth God lied. It was the serpent who…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I started out with “I’m southern ’cause I wanna be,” went on to become the Poetry Editor, and then the Poetry Editor Emeritus of this here Mule. Long live all the dead mules, especially this one. A yellow flower pops up A yellow flower pops up on…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Contributed a couple of pieces to The Dead Mule about 20 years ago. Born in central Florida, moved to north Georgia. Southern legitimacy? Family reunions always ended with my Uncle Clyde passing out shine to the men while the women gathered in Aunt Annie Mae’s spare bedroom…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: When you think the best meal in the world is a pot of pinto beans or cabbage with corn bread you have to be southern. This meal is what I’d find at my grandparents’ house when I came home from school. But the day had started with…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I once moved to Nebraska. This after 28 years of legitimate southern living in upstate South Carolina. For two cold hard Midwestern years, I shivered inside a corn farmer’s coat and dreamt of the day I’d come back South. Praise God: I don’t need to dream anymore….

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born in Atlanta, Georgia(1956), and reared in Powder Springs and Marietta. I’ve lived in Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi (and Oklahoma and West Virginia). I’ve taught at the University of Alabama-Huntsville, Tennessee Tech, North Carolina State University, LSU-Baton Rouge, Mississippi State…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Stephen Hundley was raised on the Lincoln River, south of Savannah, Georgia. When the weather was right, you might have found him in a clawfoot tub on the porch. When the game warden wasn’t around, you might have found an alligator in the tub too. Stephen’s love…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: “Georgia and Louisiana–specifically New Orleans which the rest of Louisiana hates anyway–are both located in the South and they are where I come from. My family came to Virginia from the British Isles; migrated to Georgia; didn’t spread out much till after World War II, and my…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: I was born and raised in Missouri and now live (very, very) close to Atlanta. With the exception of college, I have spent my entire life in the South. Mud An assassin’s doctorAncient brick starter materialSling to insultFacial mask soothingEye socket counterpart during champagne toastingGhost pottery wheel…

SOUTHERN LEGITIMACY STATEMENT I was conceived on a houseboat on the Ashley River in Charleston, South Carolina and was born in Monroe, North Carolina first year of the Baby Boomers. I got my undergraduate degree from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. My kin, Irish immigrants to North…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Dear Ms. MacEwan, I should not feel the need to apologize for living now in Ontario, for your name suggests first generation roots in Scotland, or at least Nova Scotia. My claim to a southern heritage comes from growing up early outside Atlanta before it became a “real”…

“12th of February, waiting on spring” February night the color of jackdaws the color of sleep under blankets the taste of dreams. Names are lost faces blurry and puffy like bad teeth in photos from another age. War again. Peace was the last bit of silver, a touch of sun….

The Southern legitimacy statement: I was raised by jackalopes. Among them were Jim Boatwright, Liz Morgan, and Dabney Stuart. Floyd A pregnant spider twists on the end of her line her web breaks my cigarette’s smoke into a hundred pieces smell of grilled pork caresses my face father-in-law smokes over…

Southern Legitimacy Statement: Dear editors, if born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, doesn’t qualify for a head to toe, imbued southerner, don’t read my poem.For twenty years, I have belonged to the Live Poets’ Society of Boca Grande, Florida, where I spend the winter these days. We published an anthology a…