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A collection of 38 posts

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Poetry by Zyen Mingo-Smoot

Zyen Mingo-Smoot is an African-American and Afro-Indigenous poet from Varnado, Louisiana. Her primary themes are tackled through the contemporary southern gothic where she gathers the 20th century genre to examine modern-day socialization, landscape, and culture of the Deep South. Winn-Dixie Something like Mardi Gras, but everyone’s in there for

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Excerpt from "Water Eyes" by Matt Brock

Matt Brock has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Mississippi and a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee. He has published fiction and nonfiction in anthologies and journals such as Appalachia Now: Stories of Contemporary Appalachia, War, Literature & the Arts, The Chattahoochee Review,

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"Kudzu" by Madeline Jones

Madeline Jones is a writer originally from Charlotte, North Carolina. She holds an M.Phil. in Creative Writing from Trinity College Dublin and completed her undergraduate studies in Anthropology and Creative Writing at Wesleyan University. Madeline continues to take workshops and explore genre at Hugo House in Seattle.   Kudzu The

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Poetry by KB Ballentine

KB Ballentine, winner of Poetry Society of Tennessee’s 2025 Best of the Fest and Writer’s Digest November 2024 PAD Chapbook Challenge, has nine collections of poetry, the most recent All the Way Through (Shelia-Na-Gig 2024). Her work also appears in numerous anthologies including: Women Speak: Volume Ten, Writing

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"Losing My Panache, the Kiowa My Witness," an essay, by Holly Hunt

Holly Hunt, essayist and poet, is from the Ouachita Mountains in Arkansas. Her work has appeared in Poetry, The Southern Review, Ploughshares, Shenandoah, Prairie Schooner, The Kansas City Star and Arkansas Democrat newspapers, and other journals. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arkansas. She lives

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"The Secret Drawer: Meaning & Memory in New Orleans," an essay, by Emily Cosper

Emily Cosper lives and writes in New Orleans, a city she has called home for over 30 years. She is a Professor of English and an academic dean at a large community college in the city. Originally from the American West, she hopes someday to split her time between New

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"Do-Wah-Do-Do" by Ellen Morris Prewitt

Ellen Morris Prewitt is an award-winning author who has lived all over, but not outside of, the American South. She was the Peter Taylor Fellow at The Kenyon Review’s Summer Writing Program and currently serves as Writer-in-Residence at 100 Men Hall, an iconic Mississippi Blues site. “Poached Peaches” is

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"Tennessee Interlude," A One Act Essay in Five Scenes, by Cindy Sams

Cindy Sams writes from Macon, Georgia, where she teaches theatre and chronicles the restless geography of Southern girlhood. Her essays appear in Reckon Review, The Plentitudes, Tiny Memoir, Brevity Blog, and others. She is the author of Humble Pie (Bottlecap Press, 2025) and is at work on her hybrid memoir

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"Whores Ain't Allowed to Say No" by Brian Longacre

Brian Longacre is many things, but the letters of “Brian Longacre,” even the big ones, have little to do with who he is. He is rather short and soft in the middle, but that's not really who he is. He is a husband, father, brother, and son, and

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"Hit the Road" by Wes Blake, excerpted from Antenna

Wes Blake is the author of Pineville Trace—winner of the Etchings Press Novella Prize, featured on Deep South Magazine's Reading List, finalist for the Next Generation Indie Book Award for First Novel, Feathered Quill Book Award for Debut Author, National Indie Excellence Award for Cover Design—from

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Poetry by T.K. Lee

T.K. Lee is the author of two acclaimed collections of poetry (To Square a Circle and Scapegoat) T.K. Lee is the author of two acclaimed collections of poetry (To Square a Circle and Scapegoat) and award-winning dramas (Paper Thin, Loose Hog, and On How To Accommodate Marlo’s

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Poetry by Linda Parsons

Linda Parsons is the Poet Laureate of Knoxville, Tennessee. She is also the poetry editor for Madville Publishing and the copy editor for Chapter 16, the literary website of Humanities Tennessee. She is published in such journals as The Georgia Review, Iowa Review, Prairie Schooner, Southern Poetry Review, Terrain, The

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"I Can't Feel at Home Anymore" by Laura E. Clemons

“Sir J. Robert Bradley was among the most popular American musicians the majority of us have never heard of. Born in Memphis in 1920, Robert went on to tour six continents during nearly 70 years as soloist and music director of the predominantly African American National Baptist Convention USA. He

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"The Parable of the Sheep and Goats" by Ken Teutsch

Ken Teutsch is a writer, performer, and filmmaker living in central Arkansas. His stories have appeared in anthologies and in such diverse publications as Mystery Magazine, Andromeda Spaceways Magazine, and Cowboy Jamboree. He also records music in the guise of perennially failed country music “star,” Rudy Terwilliger.   The Parable of

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"The Bag-Um-Up" by Kaytlin Thornton

Kaytlin Thornton is a graduate student in English at the University of South Alabama, where she is a poetry editor for Oracle Fine Arts Review. She has written articles for several of the university's student publications and her creative work has been featured in Aura Literary Arts Review

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"Through the Hills" by Jon Ross Anderson

Jon Ross Anderson was born in Timbo, Arkansas in a small community nestled in the Ozark Mountains, not far from the Missouri line. He's a student at Arkansas Tech University, pursuing a degree in literary studies, with the intention of continuing to write and study literature indefinitely. On

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Poetry by Georgann Eubanks

Georgann Eubanks is known for her guidebooks that invite readers to explore the literary, cultural, culinary, and ecological heritage of the South. The poems, “Women’s Work” and “Excursion,” are from her first volume of poetry, Rural Astronomy. These poems shift between childhood memories and her contemporary observations of the

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Poetry by Denton Loving

Denton Loving’s third collection of poems is Feller, published by Mercer University Press. He is a co-founder and editor at EastOver Press and its literary journal Cutleaf. His fiction, poetry, essays, and reviews have appeared in numerous publications including The Kenyon Review, Iron Horse Literary Review and Ecotone.   Life

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Excerpt from "Don't Go Unless You Mean It" by Nathan Gower

Nathan Gower is the author of the novel The Act of Disappearing (Mira Books / HarperCollins) as well as many short-form works published in literary journals and magazines such as the Bellevue Literary Review, Had, Louisville Review, Baltimore Review, Valparaiso Fiction Review, and elsewhere. He holds an MFA in fiction writing

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Excerpts from "Let Me Burn in Peace" by Peter Farris

Editor’s Note: Peter Farris is a new name in Southern fiction and in the South, though he has been very successful internationally, especially in France. Porchlight is pleased to introduce his work to a new, American audience and to be the first journal to publish him in English. Peter

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"Cruel Radiance" by Mark Powell, excerpted from Grievous Angels

Mark Powell is the author of six novels, including Small Treasons (Gallery/Simon and Schuster 2017)--a SIBA Okra Pick, and a Southern Living Best Book of the Year--and has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Breadloaf and Sewanee Writers' Conferences, and twice from the

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"The Plan Room" by Eli Cranor

Nationally-bestselling, Edgar Award-winning author Eli Cranor played quarterback at every level: peewee to professional. These days, he serves as Writer in Residence at Arkansas Tech, where he also lends his expertise to the university's football team, an experience he mined while drafting Mississippi Blue 42.   The Plan Room

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"Old Man Howl" by Taylor Brown

Taylor Brown is the author of In the Season of Blood and Gold (Press 53, 2014), Fallen Land (St. Martin's Press, 2016), The River of Kings (2017), Gods of Howl Mountain (2018), Pride of Eden (2020), Wingwalkers (2022), Rednecks (2024), and Wolvers (2026). You can find his work

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"Why I Quit Caring" by George Singleton

George Singleton has published ten collections of stories, two novels, a book of writing advice, and a collection of essays. Over 250 of his stories have appeared in magazines such as the Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, Playboy, the Georgia Review, the Southern Review, the Cincinnati Review, and elsewhere, his non-fiction

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"The Ride" by Robert Morgan

Robert Morgan is the author of fifteen books of poetry, most recently Terroir and Dark Energy. He has also published nine volumes of fiction, including Gap Creek, a New York Times bestseller. A sequel to Gap Creek, The Road From Gap Creek, was published in 2013. A new novel, Chasing