Jane Andrews: Four Poems
Southern Legitimacy Statement:
A daughter and granddaughter of women christened “Dixie” I was called Dixie by my father for three days, until my mother came out of the anesthesia and said, “Bless her little heart, I can’t do that to her.” Both my parents were born in Raleigh, NC. Their parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on back into the humid mists of time were Tarheels. We know how to suck the sweet from honeysuckles, how to soothe a bee sting with tobacco, when to flip a pillow to sleep on the cool side, and the charm of talc-soft red dirt stirred into a dust devil by a Chevy Impala on an unpaved road. Unlike the colonists from above the Mason-Dixon Line, I know “ma’am” is not just for addressing the elderly and that “barbeque” is a noun, not a verb. I also know that your mama’s sister’s husband’s children’s offspring are your cousins. And that you and I are also probably cousins of some degree. Who are your people?