Poem-a-Day DBF countdown: Stacey Lynn Brown

The Aug. 26 cover story “Monsters of Poetry” puts the spotlight on the poet’s art to preview the fourth annual Decatur Book Festival, to be held Sep. 4-6. This blog will count down the days to the festival by posting a poem each day by a different writer, to let the verse speak for itself. For Aug. 30, an excerpt from her book-length poem Cradle Song by Stacey Lynn Brown.

Excerpt from Cradle Song

I.

When I was four, we drove to Nashville,

Grand Ole Opry-bound, and stopped

the night at a broken down motel

in Tennessee—shag walls,

mossy carpet, dank concrete—

and I remember standing in

the doorway as evening fell,

a busful of believers rattling their way

to the pool for a makeshift

baptism, the Amens and Hear us, Lords

ricocheting through the courtyard

as underwater lights glowed

the pool algae green.