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.