Jeanne Lupton : Morning Glory Blue
The best thing about this essay besides the essay itself? We've asked Jeanne to write more for us. Betcha' can't wait until next month ...
Southern Legitimacy Statement: I grew up in Virginia and live in Norhern California now. In imagination and memory Virginia will dwell within me as long as I live as a place of summer rain, the brilliant maples of October on Barton Street, cozy nights and peaceful walks in the woods at Skyland, a walk in a blizzard up to Columbia Pike to buy a jug of Gallo Port, wanting poems in a bottle, and such memories that make a life that's a lot about the place where it happens.
Cynthia Ezell : Mountain Laurel
Southern Legitimacy Statement
In my house, Saturday nights meant fried chicken and mashed potatoes and Buck Owens on the little black and white that sat in the corner by the fireplace. Like a proper southern man, Daddy grew all our vegetables, raised beef cattle and filled the freezer with venison. My mother taught me how to make hot biscuits and red-eye gravy when I was in elementary school. Our neighbors sometimes called the police when our rabbit hounds got a bit stirred up and bellowed all night. I never knew there were people who did not put sugar in their iced tea, didn't eat cornbread with their white beans, and didn’t say y’all when addressing more than one person until I went to college. I never wanted to go anywhere else. Why would I? The South has Emmy Lou Harris, the Mississippi River, Flannery O’Connor, flaming red azaleas, catfish and stone-ground corn grits.
Tim Bullard : The Little Red Man
Tim is the oldest of Mule Friends. He is one of my very first true online friends. His talent as a writer speaks for itself. His southern legitimacy transcends a statement. Welcome back to the Mule, Tim.
April Winters : Mommy’s In a Better Place
Southern Legitimacy Statement
Grammy used to make the best rhubarb pie. Her meals were the type where every inch of the long table was covered with food: fried chicken, mashed potatoes, corn-on-the-cob, and vegetables from her garden, all topped off with rhubarb pie. Yum! She expressed her love for her family by making sure we all had full – I’m talking really full – tummies. She had a quick wit and what she called a “hillbilly” accent. She may not have been book smart, but she sure was love smart.
William Wurm : Junior Hoarder
SLS...I have only become more Southern since I last submitted anything. The story series is inspired by West Alabama (going there soon to prepare for deer season) and is written in Ocean Springs, MS.
Anthony Marshall : What Remained
SLS: I live in the REAL south, South Carolina, and, while that statement alone should legitimize my southerosity, please indulge me. I own a wardrobe sprinkled with camouflage shirts, pants, hats even though i do not hunt. When I was young, my parents told me total bullshit stories of how my grandmother, sometimes great grandmother depending on how much PBR she had drunk, (Always a female ancestor), was a Cherokee. As I grew older and realized how many of my fellow southerners had this ridiculous mythological Cherokee ancestor I quickly ditched the story. As I type this, I am wiping the slime off of my boiled peanuts on my camouflage pants and airbrushed wolf-howling-at-the-moon-while-sitting-next-to-an-indian t-shirt that I bought from the flea market.
Shelia Lamb “Lodestone”
Southern Legitimacy Statement
I grew up in Manassas, Virginia, near the battlefield. (Just 'the battlefield'). I graduated from Stonewall Jackson High School. A one-armed, long-bearded Confederate in uniform was our mascot who shot cannon blanks when touchdowns were scored at football games. It wasn't until my junior year that I understood the South had lost the war. Also, I like okra.
2013, how odd is it to type that?
Welcome to 2013. Welcome to the Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. We love your writing and we look forward to reading your submissions. Not every thing you send us is accepted BUT that does not mean it is unacceptable....
New for the end of the year …
Some new stories, a few essays … those wonderful poems. We’re leaving 2012 with a nice warm feeling. The Mule’s looking like it’s in good shape for 2013. We’ve added a really neat little plug-in that stops readers from copying...
December Fiction and Essays
Over the river and through the woods … The illustrations for the fiction and poetry sections this month come from a drawer full of old Christmas. Many of the senders are gone from this world and most of them...
Ed Laird “Crazy”
Southern Legitimacy Statement
For southern highlanders and we who are their descendants, words are revered, but reserved and used with economy. But when the few words we use fail us, music enlarges our emotional vocabularies, and our simple ballads of love and heartbreak speak volumes.
Deb Jellett “Dancing Pine Trees”
Southern Legitimacy Statement
I was born and raised in the South, occasionally eat grits, but hate football. Oh dear.
Tracei Willis “Cornbread Musing and All Such As That”
Southern Legitimacy Statement
I learned many a lesson at the hands of the women in my life, from my mama to both my grandmamas, to my aunties on both my mama and my daddy’s side, but there was one critical lesson I never actually mastered to anyone’s satisfaction, not even my own children--making a decent pan of cornbread. For as far back as I can remember, there has always been some well meaning relative in my life trying to explain the do’s and don’ts of cornbread making to me. Pull up a chair, sit awhile, and listen to some of my kinfolk explain the Holy Southern Art of Cooking Cornbread.
Poetry
Essays
