Sit for a spell

Tennessee has incoming

tides of oak trees,
crazy abandoned fields

where the devil loves to swear,

insincere Autumns past and future,

but never present.

Gossip lateralis on Grannys’ tongues

remnant of cotton pickin’ potato

mornin’s birthed of rocks and

defeated red earth,

some sort of American women

wedged between wood

stoves and salty pink dresses.

Tennessee in the summertime

is nothing but humid: They

call it as they see it, these matron

satellites of folklore and spitfire.

If you see them cussin’ with their

carous teeth, you’ll feel all right

because there’s no hesitation.

You can’t refuse a choice that

was never yours—their mommas

said choose a boy in the spring

while you’re green.

Snap his heart in two.

God is love and there is a plan:

Their men are all buried

under crunchy frozen winter

ground, but Tennessee Grannys’ still

feel like a blend of poppies and willow

bark, still smell like magnolia

leaves and baled hay.

With hints of gold on their faces,

they are cosmic and blind,

filled with insight that can stab for miles.
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Jennifer Hollie Bowles is the editor of The Medulla Review, and her writing has been accepted for publication in a variety of literary journals, such as Oak Bend Review, The New York Quarterly, Thieves Jargon, blossombones, and The Ampersand Review.