Sherry Chandler

Marianne Worthington

Of course, and thanks for the invitation. Here’s a new-ish poem from this manuscript I’m working on that includes “historical fiction” poems on women in early country music. (I hope the line breaks translate).

Cousin Emmy and Her Kinfolks
Showcar

My brother-in-law always drove the show
car, knew how to navigate every pig
track and back road without a map, could drive
safe in cities, too. Drop us at the load
out on time without a hitch. Cheerful he
was, and good hearted, a big grin to match
his wit. But Lord, he had enough of South
Knoxville still in him to park that show car
at a tilt under Mam�s old shed and prop
the door open, let his hunting dogs flop
in the back like a doghouse. So if you
were to come up on it, see that Cadillac
full of old yallow dogs, you�d think we were
right trashy. He kept the car shined up for us
and always tried to clean the seats, but we
were forever brushing dog hair
from each other�s hind ends before a gig,
blonde swirls and hanks we picked like strings,
strummed off quick
as a drop thumb on the banjo.

—Marianne Worthington, from Knoxville Girl, a work in progress

Marianne Worthington’s Finishing Line chapbook Larger Bodies Than Mine was named Appalachian Book of the Year Award for Poetry by the Appalachian Writers Association in 2007. She won the Sue Ellen Hudson Excellence In Writing Award in 2003 and was a 2005 finalist in the Sue Saniel Elkind Poetry Contest.

Marianne is editor of the just-published anthology Motif: Writing by Ear from MotesBooks for which she is hosting a reading in Knoxville this very day. If you happen to be down that way drop in to Carpe Librum Booksellers, 5113 Kingston Pike. Reading is from 2:00-3:00.

Marianne also hosts a dynamite radio show, Hillbilly Highway, each Wednesday from 3:00 – 4:00 on WCCR, University of the Cumberlands (99.4 FM). You can listen to the stream at this link. She plays “Roots with a twang and a curve! (no �hats� no Garth!)”