We Are All From Where We Are
Louisville poet Emma Aprile, winner of our inaugural Salvation South New Poets Prize, discusses her creative process, the landscapes that shape her work, and what it means to write from and for the South.
Stories
Southern Manhood
Your willingness to be a jackass will never make you a man. Writers like South Carolina’s Ray McManus are shredding the futile and stupid myths about what exactly makes a Southern man.
By Chuck Reece /
To Hear What We’ve Come for This Long Time
One time and place nourishes the next, just like your broken eggshells feed your garden.
By Linda Parsons /
It’s Always Forward
Poets can see into and beyond the surfaces of things: a slumber party, the fraught present, a forest. South Carolina’s Ray McManus shows how it’s done.
By Ray McManus /
The Survival of the Community, Not of the Fittest
The pandemic left communities in Eastern Kentucky fighting for survival and waiting on government responses that came too slowly, so Misty Skaggs turned to the ancient principle of mutual aid.
By Neema Avashia /
A Series on Neighborly Action: “Love Louder”
In this ongoing Salvation South series, we amplify the voices of Southerners who demonstrate radical love and acceptance, challenging negative regional narratives through their transformative community work.
By Neema Avashia /
The Way Love Finds You
Music, mystery, and magic are everywhere: just ask this mystic Southern poet.
By Paul Jones /
Let No One Turn You Around
The last thing her conservative Carolina parents wanted was to see their daughter fight for civil rights. The music made her do it anyway.
By Deb Bowen /
A Stranger Goes on a Journey
Coming from Louisiana and working in Germany, an anthropologist calls both places home—and so must reckon with two dark histories.
By Laney Lenox /
You Should Be Taking Notes
A posthumous collection of stories from Mississippi’s Brad Watson, who left a legacy of beautiful fiction, is just out. Alabama novelist Caleb Johnson, a student of Watson’s, has this remembrance.
By Caleb Johnson /
Best Buddies
Some things we can let go of. Other things we can stash in the bottom drawer. But the best things can stay in your heart forever.
By Justin Cox /
Sit Down and Rest a Little While
Salvation South will be on vacation for a couple of weeks. Our next batch of new stories is set for July 21.