J. B. Hogan – Four Poems
Southern Legitimacy Statement:
By now I’m beginning to run out of ways to describe how I am southern. How about born and raised in the south? How about educated in the south? How about when I moved away from the south people used to make fun of my accent – actually my own family used to make fun of my accent when I was a kid! How was that possible? They spoke exactly the same way I did. Whenever I’m outside the south, I am often asked: where are you from? Only people with clear regional speech patterns (like somebody from New Joizy, for example) are ever asked that question. Because I’m from Arkansas, people like to ask me if I go to family reunions to meet girls. Only if they are first cousins twice-removed or third cousins, I tell them. That usually stalls that whole line of questioning because I think keeping track of your family connections to that degree, while not exclusively so, is pretty southern in and of itself. I was gone from my hometown of Fayetteville, Arkansas for the better part of 40 years. Now I’m back and have become a local historian. I document our history: our local, southern history. I hope that pretty well covers the legitimacy part!
