1. Budding

In spring we drop spindly tobacco plants into the setter’s fingers. Parallel rows of green unfurl behind the tractor. When a tobacco plant is set, it is put into the ground with fertilizer and water, covered with soil, and its stems shrivel until all but the tiny center, called the “bud,” dies. Then, the bud sprouts.


This essay is published in the fall 2007 edition of storySouth click here to read Stipping the Splintered Stocks in its entirety.

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The Reverend in his quick, excited tongue, proclaims the end times are near. Every headline becomes an affirmation and a warning. As his excitement grows, he slams his fists on the lectern, stomps across the stage, his pacing accelerates in volume and pitch, until his vaulted voice builds to a battle cry of fire, brimstone, and redemption.

The congregation nods their heads, stoically looking to their sleepy Bibles. Few follow the Reverend’s sermon, but all agree with its immanence.

A child, I wait for the shouts from the congregation, the crowd leaping from their pews or patting knees. I wait for the resounding “Amen,” deafening in its wake, to lunge through the church and spill out into the parking lot.


This essay is published in The Eloquent Atheist click here to read Amen in its entirety.

I wonder where the rain makes the day new, where fallen leaves mold and tangle into unfamiliar forms. I have come to the forest so I might hear my voice, with no human voice to guide it.

From the top of the ridge I see the Earth stretch out, highway hugs the curved hills. My view free of bare branches, limbs lingering up, mounting the distance between the ground and auburn sky.

In the deep hollows there is only what the forest makes, a world burning, a world renewed, and I am captive of the stillness, drawn to the perfection of each rock and tree and leaf.

Tracing my way back home I become lost where light is cut by birches and pines scraping sky above me. And when the stream’s stream finally leads me home, I turn to look at the unclaimed world I leave, tangled behind me in the last light.


This poem was published, in a different form, in Limestone: A Literary Journal . University of Kentucky Press, 2001

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