Announcing the Winners of Jasper's Degenerate Art Project Artist's Awards

Jasper’s Degenerate Art Project II is a wrap!

Janet Kozachek - Pufferfish

Jasper is excited to officially announce the winners of the Degenerate Art Project Artist’s Awards presented Saturday, February 28th at the exhibition’s Closing Party at Stormwater Studios in Columbia.

In a night that included verboten swing dance demonstrations and lessons by Columbia’s Richard Durlach and Breedlove, the launch of Ed Madden’s new book, I Asked Him What He Needed, with a sweet little surprise chapbook titled, My Students Want to Talk About Ice: Political Poems, the reading of a banned children’s book by our favorite Drag King Marty McGuy, freshly spun tunes from Scotty Tempo, and an amazing menu by MidiMarc, the presentation of the awards was an appropriate addition to the fun.

Ivan Segura with Untitled

Congratulations to Ivan Segura for winning the Jasper Degenerate Art Project II ZEITGEIST AWARD for his painting Untitled, presented to the artist whose work best exemplified the socio-political spirit of the times while also exhibiting proficiency in execution, originality, and strong engagement with the viewer.

The Adjudicators for the Zeitgeist Award included Peter Chametzky, Harriett Greene, and Xavier Blake.

Cam Moore with Heavy

Congratulations to Cam Moore for winning the Jasper Degenerate Art Project II ARTISTS’ CHOICE AWARD for his painting HEAVY. The winner of the Artists’ Choice Award was determined by the participating artists, each of whom cast a single vote for their favorite contribution to the show.

In addition to framed certificates the winning artists also received cash prizes made possible by the generosity of our sponsors Bill Schmidt and Muddy Ford Press.

Nolan Wright - Resilient Standing Strong

Ginny Merrett - 100 Worry Dolls

Stephen White - No More Closets

Kirstin Dow - Artist

Janet Kozachek - Liberty Snakes

Thank you to everyone who came out for the Degenerate Art Project II, and thanks to Maya Smith and the welcoming artists at Stormwater Studios for hosting us. Thanks to Curiosity Coffee for keeping our thirsts at bay and to MidiMarc for feeding us so well and to WeCo Bottle & Biergarten for donating the bubbles we used to celebrate our opening night.

Thank you to our Zeitgeist judges: Xavier Blake, Harriett Greene, and Peter Chametzsky.

Sadly, it is highly likely that we will need to do this again in 2027, so please be thinking about ways to make the third iteration different and unique unto itself while still engaging with artists from all disciplines and their patrons.

WE WANT TO HEAR YOUR IDEAS!

Hit us up at info@jasperproject.org

Ed Madden Launches Newest Book of Poetry at Jasper's Degenerate Art II Closing Party

A new book by Ed Madden, postcard poems against the Trump deportation regime.

The Jasper Project is excited to announce that Ed Madden will launch his latest book of poetry — I Asked What He Needed (Squares and Rebels, 2026) — at our Degenerate Art Project II Closing Party on Saturday, February 28th at Stormwater Studios. Madden will read at 7 pm and sign books immediately after.

In addition to being a book of postcard poems, Madden’s I Asked Him What He Needed is part of the Chaps Poetry Series which is an imprint of the Squares & Rebels publishing house. Madden explains the series on the back cover of the book:

“The morning that I read Mahmoud Khalil had been arrested, I wrote a short meditation on a postcard. I had written postcard poems before, drawn to the brevity and the link between the poem and the image. I asked him what he needed for the journey. I dropped the card in the mail to a friend. But the stories kept coming. My morning meditations, contained by the small message space of the postcard, began to take into their ambit not just the deportation regime but the administration’s broader attacks on history, truth, law, democratic norms—and in the face of such fears, my own mortality. What kind of disaster did I think was coming?”

The title poem follows:

I asked him what he needed

for the journey. He said,

Write down what you saw.

Maybe, someday, the world

will want to know.

Join the Jasper Project Saturday from 3 - 9 for an exciting close to our Degenerate Art Project II at Stormwater Studios, 413 Pendleton, Columbia, SC. In addition to Madden’s book launch and reading we’ll have a banned book reading and performance by Marty McGuy, Swing Dance demonstrations and lessons from The Big Apple’s Richard Durlach and Breedlove, music from DJ Scotty Tempo, beer and wine from Curiosity Coffee, and delicious food prepared by Midi Marc.

We will also be awarding Jasper’s Degenerate Art Project II Zeitgeist Award as well as the Artists’ Choice Award, decided by a vote from the project’s participating artists.

This will be your last chance to check out the art exhibition everyone has been talking about. Don’t miss it!

SC Chapter of Authors Against Banned Books Joins Jasper’s Degenerate Art Project II with a Banned Books Free Library

The Jasper Project is excited to welcome the SC chapter of Authors Against Banned Books (AABB) to the Degenerate Art Project II opening Thursday Feb. 12th at Stormwater Studios. Headed up in SC by Columbia Poet Laureate Jennifer Bartell and Jonathan Haupt, founder of the Pat Conroy Literary Center, AABB SC is supporting Jasper's Degenerate Art Project II by providing a Banned Books Free Library that will be available at the exhibit.  

Authors Against Book Bans, a single-issue anti-censorship collaboration among published writers, poets, illustrators, editors, anthology contributors, and other book content creators engaged in protecting our freedoms to read and to write. AABB now has more than 3,500 members nationwide, and over 80 of them are here in South Carolina. 

In 2024, Jonathan Haupt and Jennifer Bartell Boykin took on the responsibility of serving as co-leads for the SC chapter of AABB. They work with the AABB national leaders, other state chapter leaders, and with our AABB members across SC to share information and resources, and to coordinate pro-literacy service activities and anti-censorship advocacy.  

According to Bartell, “Authors Against Book Bans SC has sponsored this Banned Books Free Library in support of Jasper's Degenerate Art Project II. Nazis banned and burned books. South Carolina currently leads the country in banned books.  

“Books in this library have been banned in SC and are books commonly banned across the country. This library will operate on a ‘take a book, share a book’ honor system, allowing anyone to take books for free without needing to return them, though replacing them is encouraged. Please limit yourself to taking only one book. When you have finished reading the book, please pass it on. Consider placing the book in a free library in your community for another reader to experience. You are welcomed to come back with a banned book to help us keep the library stocked.”

Banned Books List 2025 (National)

Books Banned in SC

 

Authors Against Banned Books SC needs your help! We encourage you to donate a book or money towards the purchase of banned books. We are looking for books banned in SC and books that are commonly banned across the country. See the list above to see if you have any copies of these books on your shelves that you are willing to part with: 

·  You can bring a banned book to contribute to the library when you visit the exhibit

·  You can mail a copy of the book to Bartell and she will drop it off

·  You can donate money and Bartell will purchase a banned book on your behalf. CashApp: jenniB2005; Zelle: jennifer.sharain@gmail.com; Venmo & PayPal: jennib55.

“We hope you’ll consider joining us in these efforts,” Bartell says. To learn more about AABB—and to join yourself (at no cost), please click here.     

For more about book bans in South Carolina and nationwide, Bartell recommends that you take the opportunity to stream the documentary film Banned Together, featuring many of SC’s DAYLO students alongside authors and advocates from across the country. 

From the print issue - REVIEW: THE WEIRD GIRL, Weirdness Becomes Witness—And a Way to See Our Own City Clearly

By Christina Xan

Carla Damron writes with one foot in the world of fiction and the other in the very real, very personal world of social work. In Columbia, SC where Damron herself is deeply rooted, her books feel less like imported thrillers and more like dispatches from our own streets. Her last novel, The Orchid Tattoo (Koehler Books, 2022), introduced readers to Georgia Thayer, a social worker caught up in a case involving human trafficking. With The Weird Girl (Stillwater River Publications, 2025) Damron continues Georgia’s story, this time shifting the focus to the fentanyl epidemic. The message is clear: these crises don’t just happen out there. They are happening here, woven into the fabric of Columbia. And even more striking, these crises don’t just happen but are willfully created and supported.

The plot begins with a party. Sara Clark, a high schooler, leaves the Hawthorne family’s gathering impaired by fentanyl and is struck by a Hawthorne car. Who was behind the wheel remains unclear at first, and the uncertainty becomes central to the novel’s unraveling. It looks at first like a teenage tragedy compounded by privilege, the kind of scandal that might be swept aside by lawyers and money. But in Damron’s telling, this hit-and-run becomes the key to a much larger story about how fentanyl seeps into schools, families, and emergency rooms. By the time Sara is stabilized in the ER where Georgia works, we’ve already seen this community is tainted: Cooper’s father Fletcher, a solicitor with political ambitions, will do anything to protect his son, even if it means leaning on Marcus Landry, a local drug boss. What follows isn’t so much an investigation as a slow peeling back of how deep the rot goes.

As in The Orchid Tattoo, Georgia is the heart of the novel. She is a foster mother as well as a social worker, and that dual role makes the crisis achingly personal. Her teenager Tessa hovers at the edges of temptation, just one bad decision away from the ER cases Georgia sees night after night. And Georgia herself isn’t a flawless hero: she struggles with the stigma of her own mental health history, and DSS officials question whether she is “fit” to foster at all. That tension—between how institutions judge and how individuals care—gives the book its power.

Pulling from her own experience in care work, Damron writes in short, fast-moving chapters that keep the pages turning. Her style isn’t about excess lyricism or flourish but about clarity and momentum. Conversations carry much of the weight, and sometimes you can feel the exposition slip in a bit too neatly. But the accessibility is the point: the book is designed to move, to pull you through the overlapping crises with emotional immediacy. She also shifts perspectives, weaving between Georgia, the teenagers, the Hawthornes, and even those entangled in the drug trade. That kaleidoscopic structure keeps the story from narrowing into a single vantage point and forces us to see the crisis as it ripples across every layer of the community. The result is a thriller that doesn’t just keep you hooked but keeps you alert to what’s at stake. You don’t forget that Georgia’s exhaustion mirrors that of real ER staff, or that Sara’s overdose echoes the tragedies that have played out in real schools.

What continues to help The Weird Girl stand out from more formulaic crime fiction is how it blends genre with social realism. The bones of a police procedural are here—an abduction, a cover-up, a climactic raid—but Damron keeps pulling us away from the lone-wolf detective narrative. Georgia is no hard-bitten cop; she’s a woman whose strength lies in care, in community, in refusing to look away from suffering. Even the simmering tension between her and Detective Lou, which could feel like a genre cliché, is rooted in trust and mutual reliance rather than sweeping romance. The book isn’t interested in distracting us with passion so much as reminding us that these characters are human, bruised and still reaching for connection.

The strongest thread of all is the way Damron interweaves the personal and the systemic. On one side, our characters each have their own struggles: Georgia holding onto her foster daughter, Sara fighting for her life, Lily Grace abducted after witnessing too much, Tessa wavering between rebellion and trust. These are characters—often women and girls—who do not fit, whose weirdness becomes their power. Their voices are distinct and their struggles tangible, which prevents the fentanyl crisis from collapsing into abstraction. On the other hand, you have the structural forces: Fletcher’s backroom deals, Marcus’s grip on the supply chain, DSS threatening to rip a family apart on a technicality. What could feel like two novels occurring side by side, Damron expertly merges together through her cast of distinct characters and interactions. A party overdose ripples into political corruption, a vigilante firebombing underscores the desperation of citizens abandoned by institutions, and every small story reveals the larger system grinding in the background. The book doesn’t let readers rest with the easy conclusion that drugs are bad, one we can easily separate ourselves from. Instead, it insists we reckon with how entrenched power protects the pipeline, and how entire communities are complicit in the harm.

Reading The Weird Girl feels urgent because Damron refuses to exoticize the crisis. She writes Columbia as Columbia, with no comforting distance. And while that specificity makes the book hit especially hard for those of us here, its urgency isn’t limited by geography. The networks of privilege, corruption, and exploitation Damron exposes are recognizable in cities and towns everywhere. The point isn’t just that it happens here, it’s that it can, and does, happen anywhere. The result is a thriller that doesn’t just entertain but unsettles, reminding us that these networks of corruption and compromise are not only possible but present. It’s a crime novel that asks readers to face the realities behind the headlines, and to consider what it means to fight for care in systems designed to fail.

If The Orchid Tattoo announced Georgia Thayer as a protagonist worth following, The Weird Girl confirms it. Damron has carved out a space in the crime genre that is less about puzzle-solving and more about moral witnesses, less about lone heroes and more about collective survival. For readers in Columbia, the novel lands close to home, but its reach extends well beyond these stories could unfold in any city where privilege shields the powerful and fentanyl devastates the vulnerable. Damron’s accomplishment is to make us see both at once.

Christina Xan is a former intern and member of the board of directors for the Jasper Project and is currently assistant professor of English at Northwestern Oklahoma State University.

The original version of this review appears in the Fall 20025 issue of Jasper Magazine.

CALL for Literary Art! Welcome to Gemini Arts' New Publication -- THE OTHER TWIN LIT REVIEW!

Happy to share this call for art from Gemini Arts’ Katy Harrison —

Submissions are now open for our first issue of our lit review! Our review will accompany our exhibitions and gives our non visual artist friends a chance to be published! Katy Harrison our resident poet will field all submissions! (@katyharrison_wip) 

Submission Window Open: Digital Imprint of The Other Twin, Lit Review — Issue 01

Theme: Nostalgia

The Other Twin Lit Review is now open for submissions of poetry, memoir, flash fiction, and essays exploring the theme Nostalgia.

Genres accepted:

Poetry (1-5 pieces, no more than two pages per poem, left aligned standard formatting only, please)

Memoir (under 1,000 words)

Flash Fiction (under 1,000 words)

Essays (under 1,000 words)

Submission Window: Oct 21-November 14th

Submit via: theothertwinlitreview@gmail.com

Bios (75-100 words) must be included with submission. 

Simultaneous submissions are welcome! Just let us know if your work is accepted elsewhere. Come share your polished and crafted version of what once was… or what never quite was. We can’t wait to meet your ghosts.

Our Call for Jasper's 2026 Play Right Series is Officially Open -- Deadline Feb. 28, 2026

The Jasper Project announces the 6th cycle of its Play Right Series, a collaboration between area theatre artists and Jasper Community Producers—or theater aficionados, supporters and even newcomers. The project will culminate in summer 2026 with the staged reading of a brand-new South Carolina play. 

Submitting A Play

The play submission window is now open. 

• Playwrights must be residents of South Carolina currently and during the summer of 2026.

• The winning playwright must be present for development sessions with Community Producers in Columbia during the summer, 2026 (specific dates to be determined later), and must agree to offer program credit to The Jasper Project at any subsequent productions or publications.

• Plays may address any topic, using language appropriate to the subject matter; we are not, however, considering musicals or children’s plays. 

• Plays should have no more than 5 cast members, though cast members may play more than one role.

• Submissions must be one-act plays, 45-75 minutes in length, typed according to industry-standard format (see our Sample Format). 

• Please include, as a cover sheet, a brief bio of the playwright and description of the play, including cast size and any unusual technical demands, bearing in mind that smaller and fewer are usually preferable.

• One submission per playwright, please.

• Please submit your play no later than midnight on February 28, 2026,  to playrightseries@jasperproject.org

Play Selection

When the submission window closes on February 28, 2026, the Play Right Series committee will read and select a play for development through the spring and summer. “Development,” in this case, means round-table readings with paid actors and directors that are attended by Community Producers and Professional Others, followed in the summer by rehearsals and presentation in early September 2026. 

The process will be facilitated by Jasper’s Community Producers—community members and theatre aficionados invested in the development process and supportive of the state’s literary and theatre talent. In exchange for a modest financial contribution, Jasper Community Producers will be offered insider views of the steps and processes inherent in creating theatrical art by attending readings, rehearsals, informative talks, and presentations, including conversations with the actors, director, playwright, stage manager, costumer, and sound and lighting designer. The result: Community Producers learn about the extensive process of producing a play and become invested personally in the production and success of the play and its cast and crew, thereby becoming diplomats of theatre arts.

Busted Open by Ryan Stevens (2025)

One of the perks of winning the Play Right Series Project is having your play published in book format and filed with the Library of Congress. AND, we give you a large stack of books to distribute to the producers, directors, and family members of your choice!

(Don’t forget your Mom!)

Check out the plays Jasper has already published:

Moon Swallower by Colby Quick (2022)

Therapy by Lonetta Thompson (2023)

Let It Grow by Chad Henderson (2024)

At the Jasper Project, we LOVE facilitating new art from ALL the arts disciplines! Our Play Right Series is just one of the many projects that allow us to do so.

Spread the Word! Spread the Love! Make New Art! Make Columbia an Arts-Centric Home for Us All!

Southern Gothic Festival: A Free Two-Day Festival Returns to Camden by Emily Moffitt

The Southern Gothic Festival is coming back to the cozy Broad Street of Camden, SC this October. For the fans of the spooky and esoteric, and anyone with a sense of morbid curiosity, this festival runs from the night of Friday October 10 through all of Saturday, October 11. A variety of panels featuring discussions of literature, history, and the occasional ghost tour await audiences either for free or for a nominal fee. Authors and journalists make up many of the headliners, and here are some highlights.

USC and Columbia’s own Julia Elliott, the author of beloved short story collection Hellions, novel The New and Improved Romie Futch, and the short story collection The Wilds, is participating in the panel Haunted Landscapes: The Supernatural in Southern Gothic Fiction on Saturday, October 11 at 11 a.m. in the Historic Camden Education Center, alongside other authors Nathan Ballingrud (North American Lake Monsters and Wounds: Six Stories from the Border of Hell) and Lee Mandelo (Summer Sons and The Woods All Black). Topics of this panel will include subverting genre expectations, blending psychological depth with speculative elements, and drawing on regional mythology to create narratives that are as emotionally resonant as they are chilling.

At 2 p.m. on the 11th, award-winning novelist David Joy joins the festival for a conversation on the complexities of modern Southern identity through the lens of his most recent work, Those We Thought We Knew, and his earlier novel, When These Mountains Burn. Known for his stark, lyrical prose and deeply human characters, Joy explores themes of race, rural poverty, family, morality, and place–capturing the contradictions and weight of life in the contemporary South.

And for those more intrigued in the realm of true crime, two of the biggest cases in South Carolina’s history will receive their fair share of attention. Valerie Bauerlein, a Wall Street Journal Reporter and Writer, is conducting a panel about her book The Devil at His Elbow: Alex Murdaugh and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty at 12 p.m. on the 11th, and at 4 p.m., catch Dick Harpootlian, a veteran of the Columbia courtroom, discuss his experience prosecuting Donald “Pee Wee” Gaskins and Harpootlian’s upcoming memoir about the ordeal, Dig Me a Grave.

For a full schedule of events for the two-day festival, visit the festival website at SouthernGothicFestival.com. The majority of the events are free to the public, including an opening street concert with Valentine Wolfe and Wasted Wine on the 10th at 7 p.m.

Camden’s Books on Broad to Host Author Talk & Book Signing for Kevin Sack, Author of Mother Emanuel with guest Camden Mayor Vincent Sheheen

A sweeping history of one of the nation’s most important African American churches and a profound story of courage and grace amid the fight for racial justice—from Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Kevin Sack  “A masterpiece . . . a dense, rich, captivating narrative, featuring vivid prose . . . expansive, inspiring, and hugely important.”—The New York Times (Editors’ Choice)

“Race, religion, and terror combine for an extraordinary story of America.”—Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., bestselling author of Begin Again

COVER ART BY JONATHAN GREENE

Books on Broad will host veteran journalist Kevin Sack for an author talk and conversation with guest Camden Mayor Vincent Sheheen, followed by audience Q&A and a book signing of his new book Mother Emanuel: Two Centuries of Race, Resistance, and Forgiveness in One Charleston Church on Wednesday, August 13, 2025, 6pm at Liberty Hall, Revolutionary War Visitor Center, 212 Broad Street, Camden, SC, 29020. The event is free to the public. Books will be available for purchase at the event, or, in advance of the event, at Books on Broad, 944 Broad Street, Camden. The author will sign books following the program.

Few people beyond South Carolina’s Lowcountry knew of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston—Mother Emanuel—before the night of June 17, 2015, when a twenty-one-year-old white supremacist walked into Bible study and slaughtered the church’s charismatic pastor and eight other worshippers. Although the shooter had targeted Mother Emanuel—the first A.M.E. church in the South—to agitate racial strife, he did not anticipate the aftermath: an outpouring of forgiveness from the victims’ families and a reckoning with the divisions of caste that have afflicted Charleston and the South since the earliest days of European settlement.

Mother Emanuel explores the fascinating history that brought the church to that moment and the depth of the desecration committed in its fellowship hall. It reveals how African Methodism was cultivated from the harshest American soil, and how Black suffering  shaped forgiveness into both a religious practice and a survival tool. Kevin Sack, who has written about race in his native South for more than four decades, uses the church to trace  the long arc of Black life in the city where nearly half of enslaved Africans disembarked in North America and where the Civil War began. Through the microcosm of one congregation, he explores the development of a unique practice of Christianity, from its daring breakaway from white churches in 1817, through the traumas of Civil War and Reconstruction, to its critical role in the Civil Rights Movement and beyond.

At its core, Mother Emanuel is an epic tale of perseverance, not just of a congregation but of a people who withstood enslavement, Jim Crow, and all manners of violence with an unbending faith.

KEVIN SACK is a veteran journalist who has written about national affairs for more than four decades and has been part of three Pulitzer Prize–winning teams. A native of Jacksonville, Florida, and a graduate of Duke University, he spent thirty years on the staff of The New York Times, where he specialized in writing long-form narrative and investigative reports, often related to race. He has also written for the Los Angeles Times and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and his work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine. He was a 2019 Emerson Collective Fellow at New America. A native of Jacksonville, FL, Sack lives in Charleston, SC, with his wife, Dina Sack. They have three children.

VINCENT SHEHEEN was born and raised in Camden. He was a member of the South Carolina Senate from 2004-2020 and was desk mates with Senator Clementa Pinckney on the Senate floor. He was also a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives from 2001-2004. Mayor Sheheen was elected to Camden City Council in November 2024. He holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Political Science from Clemson University and a Juris Doctor Degree from the University of South Carolina. Vincent is co-host of the popular podcast about SC politics Bourbon in the Backroom, and has published numerous essays, articles, and the book, The Right Way: Getting the Palmetto State Back on Track. Vincent’s newest book, A Concise Guide to South Carolina State Government, is expected to be released in late 2025. Sheheen and his wife Amy have three children and one grandchild.

BOOKS ON BROAD is an independent bookstore and coffee shop located in downtown historic Camden proudly serving SC roasted King Bean coffee and offering a broad selection of new, used, and collectible books. Books on Broad is open Monday through Friday 7:30 am – 6 pm, Saturday 7:30 am – 4 pm, and Sunday 9:30 am – 3 pm. Shop from the website 24/7 at www.booksonbroad.com.

REVOLUTIONARY WAR VISITOR CENTER is one of the nation’s newest regional and national attractions, the Center features the first permanent exhibit that tells the powerful story of the American Revolution, the Southern Campaign and South Carolina’s major role in turning the tide of the war. The Center is also the gateway to all Camden and Kershaw County have to offer – from historic sites and regional festivals to a multitude of events and activities. https://simplyrevolutionary.com

ERRATUM -- Selected Poetry Authors and Bionotes Transposed in Spring 2025 Jasper

In the spring 2025 issue of Jasper Magazine the authors and bio-notes for our selected poems were transposed. The poem Children of the Sun, though attributed to Li Hubbard, was actually written by Ivan Segura, and the poem Do Not Tell Me to Flee, though attributed to Ivan Segura, was actually written by Li Hubbard.

Both poems are printed and correctly identified below and will also appear in the fall 2025 issue of Jasper Magazine with the correct attributions. The Jasper Project sincerely apologizes to both poets for this error.

Do Not Tell Me To Flee

by Li Hubbard

This experiment in necrophilia

we call the South

is my home

Here I have debts to pay

trans people to love

fights to lose

ropes to loose

Dialects and state

lines cannot separate my veins 

from the delta of blueish blood

The oaks take root in my marrow

the fronds blossom from my pores

the tides stain me red

Borders carved in human skin

a queasy commitment 

so easily mistaken for butterflies

Placing my nakedness in the fresh

turned, spit

spotted soil

sinking into the mud

It is the most natural thing

we are so good at dying slow

down here

Li Hubbard is a trans writer, museum guide, and server hailing from Florida. He co-runs Queer Writers of Columbia, a LGBTQ+ collective of creatives building community around craft. Li loves to gab about art and the local coffee scene. Follow him on Instagram: @li.hubbardd | @queerwriterscolumbia

Children of the Sun

by Ivan Segura

They say we don't know 

what we want

that we all come from 

a faraway land

That we are brown 

and speak in tongues

and are in places 

we don't belong

We all arrive

for different reasons

We are here to expand 

and to become

We come for work 

and also love

We are here for fate 

or just because

We are the children 

of the sun

we roam around 

all as one

this ancient land 

to all belongs

We move with freedom 

stay strong

Are we really a nation of immigrants?

I ponder

Are we not a nation of immigrants?

I wonder

We are the children of the sun

Where we are is where we belong.

Ivan Segura serves as the Director of Multicultural Affairs at the SC Commission for Minority Affairs. He is also the Executive Director of Palmetto Luna Arts, a non-profit organization fostering Latino arts and culture in SC. He has over 20 years of experience in community activism, arts advocacy, and grassroots leadership for Latinos in SC.

Al Black's Poetry of the People Featuring Ruth Nicholson

This week's Poet of the People is Ruth Nicholson. 

I run into Ruth at all the best poetry events. Her unassuming, friendly, and soft spoken nature belies the respect she has earned within the poetry community. Her poetic voice conveys her observations and craft with a gentle, humble, economy of words that many of us wish we possessed. She is always welcomed with smiles and respect at journal and anthology release events. She is a gift to our community of words and I look forward to hearing her share her poems the next time we meet.

~Al Black

Ruth Nicholson became a South Carolina resident forty-five years ago after receiving her formal education in Pennsylvania and North Carolina. She worked for Historic Columbia Foundation, Lexington County School District Two, and finally, Richland Library. Ruth is a member of the River Poets writing group. Her poems have been published in Emrys Journal, Kakalak, Jasper, several volumes of Fall Lines: a Literary Convergence, and American Journal of Nursing, among others. A memoir essay appeared in Fall Lines X, and three of her poems are included in the new anthology Coast Lines. In 2024 Ruth received the Scotty Davis Watson Prize and the Forum Prize from the Poetry Society of South Carolina. She lives in West Columbia with her husband and an eccentric tuxedo cat.

Doctor’s Orders

Take your creaking joints and fallen arches.
March them up and down the hilly streets
in circuits of your neighborhood.
Maintain your vigor with a healthy pace.
Ignore stares from the “cool dude”
who nurses his first cigarette of the day
before he lolls with the first of many beers.
Years from now, if he lives that long,
he will trundle his aging flesh and bones
in the same shorts you wear, the same
supportive shoes and socks.
Bask in morning birdsong as you walk.
Inhale the dimming moon and climbing sun.
Exhale frayed ends of last night’s dream
and be your own best medicine.

Only the Children

An autograph rides the wind
on the underside of leaves.
Dew clings to its pen strokes.
If the sun shines, italics bloom.
Children find it etched
on the monarch’s chrysalis
and lips of daffodils.
It nests in the chambered nautilus.
No microscope brings it into focus.
It defies the graphologist,
frustrates the naturalist,
mystifies the scholar of runes.
Eyes open, they glimpse it.
Eyes closed, they feel
its letters rise to meet
their fingertips, like braille.

Even Lions

Watch and listen as our cat laps water
from her bowl, eyes half closed.
Even lions at a water hole
look and sound this innocent.
Paws that launch switchblades,
teeth that tear flesh
are the last things we think of.
We hear in the lapping
a ticking clock, the click
of knitting needles,
rain that gentles us to sleep.
We smile and keep our distance,
as if entering a church
where someone kneels alone.

Reading with Kristine Hartvigsen Coming Up April 5th

Reading with Kristine Hartvigsen

Apr 05, 2025, 6:00 PM – 7:30 PM

Greenville Center for Creative Arts, 101 Abney St, Greenville, SC 29611, USA

Kristine's work has been published in Fall Lines: A Literary Convergence, The Limelight, and State of the Heart. Muddy Ford Press published her first poetry collection, To the Wren Nesting, in 2012. Her recent collection — The Soul Mate Poems — was published last year by Finishing Line Press. She lives in Columbia, South Carolina, and her poetry was featured prominently on a mural-sized canvas on the old NOMA warehouse building in the Cottonwood Art Crawl on March 8.

A workshop with Kristine Hartvigsen titled Haiku and Other Short-Form Poetry will precede the reading from 4 - 5 pm.

Presented by

Poetry of the People featuring Brooklyn Brown

This week's Poet of the People is Brooklyn Brown. 

Every year, two or three young poets meander into Cool Beans and adopt Mind Gravy Poetry as their home away from home. They are in love with poetry, but put off by the way they have been taught poetry; they believe the best poetry is from the heart - understandable and not obtuse. 

Brooklyn is a bolt of light in a fearsome night and assures me that poetry is cradled in good young hands.

~Al Black

Twenty-year-old Brooklyn Brown is a student at U of SC and believes that art is activism. She practices this notion through her poetry. She hopes to be a voice for young people who are struggling with the ups and downs of early-adulthood while also confronting bigger world issues. A creative from a young age, Brooklyn often expresses the turmoil of her own adolescence in her writing. Brooklyn is inspired by the classic romantic and confessionary poets that came before her, and hopes to connect with her readers’ senses through concrete language and vivid imagery, believing that good poetry is not only understood, but felt.

Peeling Oranges 

I split my finger 

on a piece of paper 

yesterday. 

today, 

you want oranges. 

you enjoy the way

the pulp does glut 

your shallow throat. 

and if the consumption

should bring you pleasure, 

I will peel and peel–

only stopping for a moment

inbetween, to wince

at the citrusy sting.

____

Question 

I have a question—

for legislators who have

an obsession with oppression, 

and teaching lessons 

that put people in their proper places

assigned by the shapes

of the features on their face, 

or the colors of

the skins 

that they live in. 

I have a question—

for the men in these positions 

at the top of their systems, 

I have question, 

about my body, 

about its most vital organ, 

not my mitochondria heart, 

but my ovaries, of course. 

I think that they are art— 

But, do their brush strokes

maim you? 

because they paint a mirror image of

the same ones that

made you? 

Is it self loathing or a hatred 

for the woman who created the soul

that would grow to rule 

the bones of a man so cruel

as you? 

Is it because your mother put 

her foot down 

since your father was 

never around? 

Do you still feel the weight of 

her on your little head

each night before bed

while you lay to rest

next to your wrinkling wife, 

who you’d stab with a hunting knife

if the decision of that fatal incision 

would not make you

look like a bad guy? 

do you dream that

your work to earn 

the respect of your daddy even

after he’s dead will pay

as well as the price of the 

people you damned to hell,

because maybe, 

in heaven you’ll throw a ball

back and forth and 

and back and forth

with him? 

and your miserable actions

will be worth

the poison of your politics, 

because at least you remembered 

to pray about it?  

oh, and I have a question—

for the righteous and resolute; 

if I don’t believe in the same god as you,  

must I burn for the sins that

killed your savior? 

must I adhere to the rules of a ruler 

who I owe nothing to, just because 

you say that’s what I should do? 

are millions of us wrong just because 

you will die on the hill 

where you took a red pill 

that told you you were right? 

well, what if 

my mother’s words

are my hymns, 

and when I hear them

they give me breath 

like my mind has grown a lung, 

and I worship the earth—

because it is she

 who is my creator,  

I’ve been my own savior 

since birth, and I crucified myself to stand

up straight and tall today? 

Is it not good

enough for you, 

that I am imprinted

on the opposite side 

of your same copper penny?

Will you not rest 

until I pass 

your grueling test, 

until you’re sure that 

I’m a perfect copy

of your idealistic embossing?

I’m left deafened by your preaching 

that drowns out children’s cries

who we could have helped

if you’d just be quiet, and listen

for one minute. 

so my question is— 

If you died today

would you die a martyr,

or a failure? 

was your mission for goodness lost 

under your hunger

to indoctrinate innocents? 

Would Jesus be proud 

of your mansion,

while hungry kids imagine 

a fridge full of food 

in a kitchen as big 

as the one that your

god-honoring 

family dines in tonight? 

you make sure to lead 

in saying grace, 

but did you ignore

 your teenage daughters’ 

pale face

as she stares 

at her untouched dinner plate? 

Do you thank god for the meal

that the help prepared, 

and ask for blessings 

before your son runs 

to the bathroom, to hide 

eyes full of acidic tears

because he fears to be 

feminine, so feeling

feelings makes him scared? 

I have a question— 

for leaders who

don’t lead by example; 

is it purpose or power, 

that fuels you? 

is it oath or ego? 

that is my question.

____

Dreams

A river flowing through

my dreams, 

taking pictures far

from me;

good and bad, 

and in between–  

they all float down 

the angry stream; 

until my mind is fresh 

and clean,

and I wake up on my 

sheets serene,

only dampened

by the feelings

that the erosion

left behind overtime. 

I dreamt a dream

 of better things,

and then I dreamt 

I grew white wings 

and flew too close

to a star, ‘till I burned

and turned

torched and charred. 

Lard with color and 

poignant plotlines,

I dream some dreams 

of beautiful things– 

that dense and darken 

before I wake, 

and then my memory

my dreams doth take.

____

TREPIDATION

The trepidation 

of my twenties 

is tilling over my

noisy nerves 

which wont shut up 

about my body,

or the boy

that i'm afraid 

will get bored of it– 

and I think when

I am an old lady

I’ll eat the pies

I bake instead 

of giving them 

away;

I’ll put extra cream

 into my coffee cup;

I’ll write a book

 for young people 

to read;

I think I’ll smell

like nectarine–

and maybe I’ll learn 

to play guitar and sing. 

I think i’ll feed pigeons 

by a fountain, 

and climb

a big mountain;

just to say it’s 

something I did; 

I think I’ll mentor 

a creative little kid. 

I think I might frequent

local art galleries, 

and be known by some

as “that quirky old lady”;

I think I’ll travel more, 

with someone I  adore–

I think I will make a lot

of soup out of peas, 

that no one will like 

to eat but me. 

I think i’ll reach out to a friend

 from high school

and spend more

 of my summers

 in a swimming pool; 

I think i’ll wear 

a cute swimsuit, 

and ignore the way it fits

my herky-jerky divots. 

I think I’ll start to pray; 

not to god,

but to my mother, who

I wish could live forever 

and always be there 

to give me her best answers. 

I think I’ll have children;

 in the form of house cats– 

and wear colorful 

bucket hats. 

I think I’ll care less

 about what people

think, and I will finally love

 all of my body;

because when I wrinkle 

and begin to grey

I’ll thank my bones

 for carrying me 

every day– 

even when my tattoos

 begin to fade

I’ll still have stories

 to tell the twenty-somethings,

 as well

as secrets to take

 to the grave; 

and when I think

 about my face

and how it might look, 

in a few decades– 

I smile at the picture

and wish that

I could hug her

she looks like me, 

but softer;

she’s full of forgiveness

 and laughter

she's a spitting image 

of her golden mother, 

she’s got paleing hazel 

eyes like her father, 

and the confidence

 of her brother. 

But I am her,

and she is me–

 she is everything I can be 

So I don’t have to wait 

to heal my heart,

or create my art;   

I think I just have to start.

Al Black's Poetry of the People featuring Xavier Khalil

This week's Poet of the People is Xavier Khalil. 

A few months ago, Xavier showed up at Cool Beans for Mind Gravy, he sat quietly in the back, eventually, he shared on open mic and kept coming back for more. He made friends with the regulars and felt confident enough to have his own 30 minute feature. 

Xavier is a kind and passionate poet with a voice that needs to be heard and I am blessed to have him in my creative life.

~Al Black

Xavier Khalil is a native of Atlanta, Georgia. He has been involved in the arts from the age of 8; participating in oratorical contests in elementary school. He moved to Beaufort, South Carolina to receive better education opportunities and lived with many family members while attending high school. Creative writing has been a lifelong hobby for Xavier, and more recently has found his love for poetry in 2023. The 22-year old's poetry reflects the essence of the Black queer experiences surrounding themes of spirituality, love, activism, and life's quarrels with grief and addiciton. These passions are further extended in Xavier's work through his podcast Choosing Joy and various social media platforms where he constantly advocates for humanity. He is an alumnus of the University South Caolina Aiken where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in Communicaiton with a minor in Sociology. Currently Xavier is working on his Master in Higher Education and Student Affairs degree at the University of South Carolina in Columbia." 

“Meet Me”

Meet me at the coffee shop

Across the street from the Horseshoe –

Park by the meter

And, I’ll meet you at 2

This scene fits us

Is there an us?

Is it too early to discuss?

Maybe an idea we both want

I trust.

No matter I just want you –

I mean be with you –

I mean experience you –

Wait.

I just enjoy your company

Is all

How we engage

In conversation

And swoon as each other talks

Its cute

How we banter

Going on about psychology

(Stanza 5)

Sociology, biology

Theology, geography

Nationalities

Whew its…

And did you say

Music?

You be the R&B

To my neo-soul

You go On & On

Like Erykah’s songs

Making my soul glo

You’re “Golden” boy

Like Jill

Caught constantly

Giving me the feels

And chills and thrills

From Black history

To Mariah vs Whitney

Singin’ lil songs

Hearing you, “Say My Name”

Can we admit we’re

(Stanza 9)

The Children of Destiny?

After this please

Let there be more

Don’t let it end

Once you close your car door

After this

Come see me

Not in my visions or dreams

Comes see me, physically

Come see me, again, spiritually

Strip me emotionally

Nigga come see about me!

And allow me to be naked – fully

Sorry, if that’s too much

If, it was too strong

I’m sorry

I promise I wont do any wrong

Don’t run, please…

I’ll just be your friend

I know that love’s too scary

And we don’t want this to end

(Stanza 13)

So, I’ll just be your friend

May the love of our bond

Grow true

 And organic

But until then…

Meet me at the coffee shop

Across the street from the Horseshoe

Park by the meter on Monday

And I’ll meet you at 2. 

"Bridges and Railroads" 

Driving across the Broad River Bridge

It’s so different now

So the same

So opposite simultaneously

Chocolate neighborhoods

Replaced by golf courses

Shops for mommas and poppas

No replaced by corporations

Because they bought someone

Reparations

Thanks to high taxation

Chocolate faces

Moved to other chocolate places

Across the bridge – 2 or 3 –

On the other side of train tracks

2 or 3

Only for suited giants

To do it again

Killing off the wildlife

Destroying their land

Mossy, ancestral trees

Collapse

No care for the significance

Removing black bodies

Further from themselves

Because you pull them

By the root

It’s now deer season

But the bullets aren’t hitting

The right young Buck.

The shooter is jailed

While the true hunter

Mounts the bodies on the walls

Using the black bodies

And the brown/red skin

As rugs and mink coats

As you dwell in a home

Erected in a plot of land

That was once their own

Ignorance of the beautiful

Culture and bodies that inhabit

Are encouraged

Looked at as anomalies

Oddities of black magic

and spirituality

Not realizing

These beings are

Slowly being ostracized

Tantalized by outsiders

Who see their existence

As profit

And the lost minds

Haven’t a clue of what to do

About it.

Displaced

Shoved into obscurity

In massive fish tanks

Of barren yards

And unstable mobile homes

Chocolate people

Are losing their way.

In their home

Didn’t think I’d see the day. 

“Brown Boys Feel Fluorescent”

I make you feel like

A white boy?

Some safety

Visibility

Security

You adore from me?

I validate you

And give you innate freedom

In tandem

Denying myself that same

The right to exist

And be cherished

For the humanity

In your brown body

I make you feel

Like a white boy

Brown boy

I cherish

You make me feel like

Like a spirit

You make me feel like

Like a spirit

So big

Infinite

Free and confined

You give me space to be wild

You to have grand emotions

To obsess

To express

Display feelings

Be passionate

But, in making

Me feel my spirit

Makes me feel

Trapped in this human experience

I inherited

This one that you hardly

Acknowledged

This body you barely

Touch

This figure

That houses the very spirit

You freed

I make you feel

Like a white boy?

Not spoiled, but entitled –

Deserving.

Privileged.

You make feel like –

Like a spirit

Not holy; certainly not evil

Just too free

Too astral

Unfortunately

You only see that

The reinforcement of

Perfection

Not giving a human connection

I am guilty for this

I am merely a reflection

Of how you view

What is perfected

So in making you

Feel like a white boy

-protected-

You make me feel like Spirit

-easily neglected-

Picking and choosing

When to feel my presence

Yearning for me

But so displeased by

Your imperfection

My love you constantly

reject it

Oddly, I cannot be mad

At you

Because seeing my spirit

Means the “white boy”

In you wants to protect

Protect my pride

Protect my freedom

Protect my ambiguity

 My duality

Protect me from your truth

Protect my vibrant spirit

From being dimmed by you

Brown boy

Blue bird

Look at your reflection

In the river

Let the water cleanse your feet

It’s not whiteness you feel

It’s a freedom you’ve been denied

The freedom that heals

A freedom I had no clue

I could even give

As I look

My spirit

Shines outside this skin

It glows outwardly

And vibrates through me

Within

Standing parallel

Across the street

We a re on

You and me

Living separately

The Spirit you see

In me

Is shared

We share it with Thee

So, I thank you

Thank you for helping me to see

Brown boy I made feel safe

Thank you for recognizing

My grandness

The protection

The freedom

The privilege I afforded

It didn’t make you feel “white”

It finally made things

Feel to a degree

Alright

And you important

Hand to hearts

Eye to eye

Soul to soul

Brown boys make

each other feel free

protected and safe

Brown boys dance

In the dark

In the nighttime

Becoming jovial

-effervescent-

Transcends them

To fluorescence

Brown boys made

Each other feel like glowing

Bright, white

Hues

I never made you

Feel like a white boy

I simply made you feel your spirit, too.

“It’s Foggy Outside”

It’s foggy outside

In these times

There are blurred lines

Where cars and worlds

 Collide

It’s cold and wet

Out here

Be careful

Don’t slip

The weather makers are

Praying on your downfall

Our downfall

If you will

They want hit and runs

They want blame

They want pointing fingers

Stinging scars and burns

Cause by their flames

It’s foggy outside

Be careful walking

Through these low clouds

Be careful stalking

For your next meal

Stay low to ground

Look out for your neighbor

Don’t hurt each other on your prowl

In these times

Wanting to thrive

What a luxury to be

Alive

Right now we just survive

Until the sun dies

Behind the rain clouds

The sun still shines

But the time we once had

Is no longer on our side

Its of essence

And its precious

As the fog children

Walking in the midst

Of a global depression

It’s cold

It’s foggy

It’s rainy

It’s nasty

Barely sunny

It’s the time slipping

Down the road

And through our fingers

Please feel the hope

The faith

That still lingers

Don’t be fooled by

The occasional peak

Of sun during dark day time

Don’t let the warm day time

Dry up your inside

Don’t let confusion make

Your temperature rise

Be looking out the window

Because its foggy outside

Call for Literary Artists - Wine About It Anthology Series

The Wine About It Anthology Series is a collection of stories focused on resilience, identity, and community, highlighting diverse voices and experiences from across South Carolina. Each volume showcases the diverse culture of the state with local narratives, celebrating storytelling, culture, and social justice. Paired with unique wine selections that enhance the reading experience, the series offers an immersive, sensory connection between literature and wine.

This collaborative initiative brings together Lit Between the Wines, Liberation is Lit, and Uncut Gems Agency to curate a dynamic experience that fosters community engagement, education, and empowerment. Each business plays a crucial role in uplifting underrepresented voices while promoting social justice through storytelling. The series culminates in Wine & Vinyl: A Multidisciplinary Art Exhibit, where literature, wine, and visual art offer a celebratory experience that reflects the rich cultural landscape of South Carolina.

ESSAY -- A Legacy of Greens: Cooking Memories with Birdie and Betty Jean, By Marcum Core

Special to Jasper Online

photo by Marcum Core

I can’t look at a bunch of greens without thinking about my grandmother, Birdie Shivers, and my aunt, Betty Jean Carlisle. Both were incredible cooks, the kind who could turn humble ingredients into meals that made you feel loved and full in every sense of the word. Spending time with them in the kitchen was a privilege—and a lesson in patience, humility, and flavor.

My grandmother, Birdie, was the queen of efficiency. She ruled her kitchen with precision, and if you weren’t actively helping, she wanted you out of the way. Watching her cook was like watching a master at work: her hands moved quickly, expertly rinsing, and seasoning greens with an ease that only comes from decades of experience. There was no measuring—just a pinch of this, a splash of that, and somehow, it always came out perfect. I had a dedicated spot in the breakfast nook that allowed me to see everything, soaking up her techniques like a sponge. My favorite was when she would mix turnip and mustard greens. Tender greens was the term she used for that combination.

I have always appreciated the regional and familial nuances in soul food cooking. Birdie, hailing from Detroit, MI by way of Sardis, MS was from the school of stem removal and would talk about people left “All dem stems” in their collard greens. Perhaps that’s why she enjoyed mixing mustards and turnips because the stems weren’t so robust and the whole leaf could be used. 

I always looked forward to being Aunt Betty Jean’s little helper in the kitchen. I was much younger when she looked after me, but old enough to help her shell peas and mix the cornbread batter. She’d hum a song while she was preparing the meal which typically (while I was in town visiting at least) included collards. The most rememberable thing about my Aunt Betty’s greens were how fine they were chopped. They were chopped before cooking and chopped even more after they were done cooking and not served with pot liquor versus my grandmother who left all of the liquid in the pot. Come to find the technique my Aunt Betty used is common in Eastern North Carolina, Goldsboro. I grew up eating their greens. Both are very different styles but with similarities. They both believed in removing the stems and cooking intentionally with love. 

The smell of simmering collard greens was like an embrace. It filled the house and signaled that something good was coming. By the time dinner was ready, the greens were tender and infused with a depth of flavor that only slow cooking can create. They were served alongside cornbread, black-eyed peas, and whatever else was on the menu, but for me, the greens were always the star.

Now, every time I make greens, I think of Birdie and Betty Jean. 

Their lessons weren’t just about cooking. They were about life: finding joy in the process, taking time to do things right, and sharing what you create with the people you love. Every pot of greens I make is a tribute to them, to their wisdom, and to the countless meals that brought our family together.

So, when I look at a bunch of greens, I see more than just a vegetable. I see my heritage, my family, and the women who showed me that food is love. And no matter how many times I make them, greens will always taste better when seasoned with their memories.

MIDIMarc, also known as MIDIMarcum, is a music producer and recording engineer from Hopkins, SC, with over 20 years of influence in South Carolina’s hip-hop scene. Renowned for his mastery of sampling, he has remixed albums by icons like Nas and Jay-Z, created tribute projects honoring Michael Jackson, The Notorious B.I.G., and Pimp C, and earned accolades such as Jasper Magazine’s 2018 Artist of the Year. A 5x Beat Battle Champion and creator of the instrumental series Prolific, he has collaborated with key South Carolina artists like Master Splnta and DJ Cannon Banyon, cementing his legacy as a pioneer and inspiration in the state’s hip-hop culture.

Join the Jasper Project and SCAA for a Reading and Launch Celebration of Southern Voices – Fifty Contemporary Poets Edited by Tom Mack and Andrew Geyer

By Cindi Boiter

Poetry and place come together beautifully in Tom Mack and Andrew Geyer’s (editors) new book, Southern Voices – Fifty Contemporary Poets (Lamar University Press) Which launched on October 1st on the campus of University of SC at Aiken, where Mack is a distinguished professor emeritus and Geyer serves as chair of the English Department. The two previously worked together editing the fiction anthology, A Shared Voice: A Tapestry of Tales (Lamar University Press, 2013), and have joined forces once again to bring us a new and intriguing look at contemporary poetry from the South.

“Because of the overwhelming success of that collection of paired tales, the folks at Lamar University Literary Press wondered if we could put together an equally attractive book of poems,” Mack says. Mack also edited Dancing on Barbed Wire (Angelina River Press, 2018) which Geyer co-wrote with Terry Dalrymple and Jerry Craven. “We knew from the outset of the multi-year project that we wanted to cover the whole South from Virginia to Texas, from Arkansas to Florida; and we thought that 50 would be the minimum number of poets (4-6 poems by each) that we would need to do justice to the complex geography and culture of this distinctive region of the country.”

South Carolina poetry aficionados will not be surprised by the list of distinguished contributors to Southern Voices, among them Jasper’s own poetry editor and inaugural Columbia city poet laureate, Ed Madden, along with Libby Bernadin, Marcus Amaker, Ron Rash, Glennis Redmond, and forty-five equally accomplished poets from across the region.

“Once we decided on how many poets to include in the book,” Mack says, “we divided the South in half. Because I had edited the South Carolina Encyclopedia Guide to South Carolina Writers (USC Press) and managed the USC Aiken writers’ series for over a decade, I volunteered to invite 25 poets from the Atlantic coast, the part of the South I know best. Drew (Geyer), a native of Texas and a member of the Texas Institute of Letters, focused on Southern states from Alabama to west of the Mississippi.”

The theme of “place” features prominently in this collection, Mack says. “It thus made sense to invite as many state and local poets laureate as possible since those individuals had already been selected by governmental entities to represent a particular locale. All of the Southern states have state poets laureate; and some states, such as South Carolina, have poets laureate who have been selected to represent cities and towns. Columbia, Charleston, Greenville, and Rock Hill, for example, have municipal poets laureate. Thus, we were expecting that most of the poems submitted by each invited poet would focus on place: physical, emotional, spiritual, or psychological. We were not disappointed.”

But the co-editors recognized early on that the representation of contemporary Southern poets looks increasingly different than in decades past, as it should. “From the very beginning of the process, we wanted to put together a book that reflected the changing demographics of the region, its growing diversity and burgeoning equality of opportunity. Thus, in choosing our invitees, we kept gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation in mind,” Geyer says.

In his introduction to the volume Mack writes, “Perhaps no other region of this vast country is haunted more by the past. In the case of the American South, heavy lie the legacy of slavery and the specter of the Civil War. … Yet, the winds of change can be felt throughout the American South, due in large part to both a generational and demographic shift—the region is consistently being enriched by transplants from other parts of the country and other nations of the world.”

“This Southern Voices collection is a testament to how far we’ve come,” Geyer agrees. “The poets in this anthology are Black and white and brown, straight and LGBTQ+, native Southerners and northern transplants—a mélange of artists from across the Greater South most of whom have served as the poets laureate of their states and/or local communities. These are the poets whose work everyday folks living in the South chose to represent them. The diversity of voices that you’ll find in this incredible volume is reflective of the people who make the place what it is.” 

Launch celebrations and readings for Southern Voices are scheduled  throughout the state. The public is invited to attend the Columbia event, sponsored in part by the Jasper Project and the South Carolina Academy of Authors, from 6 to 8 pm on November 14th at All Good Books in Five Points. Poets scheduled to read from the collection include Ed Madden, Glenis Redmond, Libby Bernardin, and Ellen Hyatt.

A version of this article appeared in the Fall 2024 issue of Jasper Magazine - Available now throughout Columbia

Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month by Supporting Local Hispanic and Latino/a Creators by Christina Xan

National Hispanic Heritage Month runs from September 15 – October 15 and highlights and celebrates Hispanic and Latino heritage and identity in the United States. Hispanic (those from Spanish-speaking countries) and Latin (those from Latin America) culture is rife with history that enriches the communities we dwell in.  Columbia is one of these diverse spaces, and the art that emerges from this city, specifically, is inundated with a multitude of cultural perspectives. This Hispanic Heritage Month, Jasper encourages all patrons to seek out multidisciplinary art from Hispanic and Latino/a artists and to explore how the creators’ backgrounds affect their work.  Don’t know where to start? Jasper talked with six Columbia-based artists about how their cultural identity affects their creative process. Learn about them and their work below.

Daniel Esquivia Zapata

Daniel Esquivia Zapata – Visual Artist

 Describe the kind of art you make.  

Daniel’s work explores ideas about historical memory, official historical narratives, and what he terms the politics of remembering. He does this through life-size figurative drawings that combine historical texts, the human body, plants, and animals to generate strong spaces that work as poetic imagery, probing the dynamics of narratives in history and historical memory. This represents an exercise not only of why and what, but also of how we remember, especially in societies with conflicting narratives, obfuscated historical memories, and legacies of colonialism. He uses a combination of traditional figure drawing techniques, liquid charcoal and fragmented print and hand-written texts to draw on several layers of mylar, creating life size drawings that combine representations of the human body, plants, and animals to create news bodies that work as metaphors for political bodies intersected by history, newspaper articles and archives. With these drawings Daniel seeks to unveil the "place of memory" within our bodies amid intersecting discourses, making tangible the essence of our collective past and present. His work has driven him to create images that replace the common container metaphor of memory with one that understands memory as something dynamic and interconnected; something alive, inhabited by ideas, narratives, and discourses that live, age, die (or are killed); something like an ecosystem of memories and narratives, and ecosystem that is inhabited by beings of texts.  

Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.  

In Daniel's life, a multiplicity of narratives and multinational experiences has made him think deeply about the dynamics of discourse and narratives in our societies, especially as an Afro-Latino in the Americas. For Daniel, the intersection of different identities has profoundly influenced his work. His experiences as the son of a human rights lawyer and a social worker in a multiethnic and multiracial family in Colombia; as a victim of forced displacement from his hometown in 1989; as an Afro-Colombian who studied at a HBCU in the US South [Benedict College]; and as a citizen living in Colombia and grappling with the legacies and present realities of its civil war; these experiences have all presented points of encounter with the forces of history’s multiple faces—unofficial, alternative, contested, surviving—that build and situate someone’s identity. 

Alejandro García-Lemos

Alejandro García-Lemos – Visual Artist

Describe the kind of art you make. 

Alejandro García-Lemos is a visual artist based in Columbia, South Carolina and New Orleans, Louisiana. He holds a MA in Latin American Studies from Florida International University in Miami, and a BA in Graphic Design from the School of Arts at the National University in Bogotá, Colombia. His work focuses on social issues, mostly on aspects of immigration, sexuality, biculturalism, religion, and community. His works have been shown mostly in the Southeast. Alejandro is a former member of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture (NALAC), as well as the founder of Palmetto & LUNA, a non-profit organization promoting Latino Arts and Cultures in South Carolina since 2007. Lately his work has been shown in Colombia. 

Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.  

For this particular question I had to look up the exact definition of cultural identity … Cultural identity is a part of a person's identity, or their self-conception and self-perception, and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality, gender, or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture. Therefore my cultural identity is omnipresent in my work, as I had mentioned many times before, I am three times a minority, I am Latinx, gay, and immigrant, how could you avoid those aspects as an intrinsic part of all your art? 

Emily Moffitt

Emily Moffitt – Visual Artist

 Describe the kind of art you make. 

The type of art I create boils down to what I have the most fun with. I'm still trying to make my way in and have my foot in the door of the Columbia art scene! Like most Gen Z artists, I got into art from a young age via immense media consumption: video games, anime, cartoons, comics, and the list continues. As a result, the kind of work I create typically falls under the "illustration" category. I go back and forth between illustration and fine art, and sometimes I still think the distinction shouldn't even matter! As a recent college graduate who has now experienced the adulthood rite of passage that is working a 9-5 while still having time for hobbies, as long as I take even 10 minutes of my day to get my hands moving and draw something in my sketchbook, it's a successful day for me. 

Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.  

The "fine art" I created started with a body of work that explored my heritage and connected to it more after my grandmother passed away in 2021, and I aim to continue it either by maintaining the "dreamscape" title or by starting a new collection. My goal in the fine art world is to create a body of work that I'm constantly thinking about, called "My Mother's Kitchen," since the closest ties I have to my Puerto Rican heritage stem from cuisine, my relationship with my mom, and the amount of time I spent growing up in and around the kitchen watching my mother make the recipes she grew up making with my grandmother. At this point, it's just a matter of me finding the time, and holding myself accountable, that's preventing me from following through! I do find that my mixed heritage sometimes feels like an obstacle when I do work, however, and that's an internalized hurdle I try to overcome when I create, too. Taíno symbology persists throughout my heritage-based work, and I wanted to also focus on the importance of my relationships with my mom and sister. My Puerto Rican heritage has been driven and shaped only by women in my life, and I wanted to pay homage to that, especially since my sister and I feel the same internalized obstacle of sometimes feeling "not Latina enough."  

Claire Jiménez – Author

Describe the kind of art you make.  

Claire Jiménez is a Puerto Rican writer who grew up in Brooklyn and Staten Island, New York. She is the author of the short story collection Staten Island Stories (Johns Hopkins Press, 2019) and What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez (Grand Central, 2023). She received her M.F.A. from Vanderbilt University and her PhD in English with specializations in Ethnic Studies and Digital Humanities from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. In 2019, she co-founded the Puerto Rican Literature Project, a digital archive documenting the lives and work of hundreds of Puerto Rican writers from over the last century. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of English and African American Studies at the University of South Carolina. 

Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.

My writing is very much influenced by the work of past Puerto Rican writers, especially the Nuyorican poets. I am thinking of Pedro Pietri's "The Puerto Rican Obituary" and the work of Judith Ortiz Cofer. I remember reading Silent Dancing and "The Story of My Body" for the first time as a young person, who had a hard time finding books by any Puerto Rican authors in the bookstore in the nineties. These texts were inspiring to me as a young reader, and they definitely shaped me as a writer.

Loli Molina Muñoz

Loli Molina Muñoz – Author 

Describe the kind of art you make. 

I write poetry and fiction. I have just finished my first poetry chapbook manuscript in English, and I also have a feminist dystopia novella in Spanish, both of them searching for a warming publishing house.  

Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.  

Being born and raised in Málaga, Spain, I grew up immersed in both Spanish and English language thanks to literature, music, and pop culture, which deeply influenced my work. However, I have also lived in Coventry (UK), Wisconsin, and finally moved to South Carolina in 2013. For this reason, my work explores themes of identity, feminism, migration, and the intersections between cultures.

[ALMA] SPANISH

Querida madre:

Estos días pienso mucho en usted.

Ayer me acordé de su guiso de 

carne y quise hacer uno yo. 

No me supo igual. 

Me faltaba el sabor añadido de sus 

manos y el olor de su delantal. 

Los niños dijeron que estaba muy 

bueno. Yo les di las gracias y sonreí.

Dos lágrimas que se escaparon 

disimulando para no ser vistas. 

Tampoco vieron las dos cartas del

banco avisando del desahucio. 

Les dije que vamos a pasar unos 

días en casa de Alejandra.

Les hizo ilusión pasar un tiempo 

con sus primos y eso me alivió. 

Luego recordé aquella vez que

usted me dijo que eligiera mi 

muñeca favorita.

Crucé el desierto de la mano de 

Alejandra con la muñeca pegada 

a mi pecho como un amuleto. 

Aún conservo mi muñeca.

Aún tengo a Alejandra. 

Voy a estar bien. 

No se preocupe. 

[ALMA] ENGLISH

Dear mother,

These days I think about you all the time. 

Yesterday I remembered your beef 

stew and I made one myself. 

It did not taste the same. 

It did not have that extra flavor from 

your hands or the smell of your apron. 

The kids said that they liked it. 

I thanked them and smiled. 

Two tears escaped trying not 

to be seen by them. 

They did not see the two eviction

 letters from the bank either. 

I told them that we are going to stay 

some days at Alejandra’s. 

They were happy about spending 

time with their cousins and that soothed me. 

Later I remembered that time 

you told me to choose my favorite doll. 

I crossed the desert holding Alejandra’s 

hand and the doll stuck

to my chest like an amulet. 

I still keep my doll. 

I still have Alejandra. 

I’ll be fine. 

Don’t worry. 

Giovanna Montoya

Giovanna Montoya – Ballet Dancer 

Describe the kind of art you make.  

I’m a professional ballet dancer, so my art is dance. Ballet is a theatrical art form that integrates music, dance, acting and scenery to convey a story, or a theme.

 Describe the role your cultural identity has in your work.

My cultural identity represents who I am; a dedicated, driven, disciplined, strong woman, which stands up for what’s right, and never gives up. I am always aiming to move forward, trying to do better every day, even if it is little by little, and working hard to achieve my dreams and goals. These have been imperative assets to possess, that have helped me to become a professional ballet dancer with 15+ years of experience. Ballet is a beautiful but difficult art form, which requires a lot of time, sacrifice, effort, love, endless hours of training, and a great deal of discipline and dedication. I would never have become a professional ballet dancer if it weren’t for the commitment, dedication, responsibility, and integrity that my parents showed and instilled in me from a young age. Coming into this country as an immigrant it’s very difficult, and you have to work very hard to achieve success. That’s something my parents made very clear to me from the beginning, and they led by example. Always working hard, never giving up and excelling in their fields. My dad is a statistician for the Mayo Clinic. My mom is a Veterinarian doctor and was a University Professor in my home Country Venezuela. I’m so thankful for my parents and my cultural identity that has shaped me, and played a pivotal role in the person that proudly I am today.

Poetry of the People with Evelyn Berry

This week's Poet of the People is Evelyn Berry. Over a decade ago, led by Evelyn Berry, an inspired group of Aiken High School students would pile in a car and journey to Columbia to attend Mind Gravy Poetry. I am fortunate to still know several of them through the wonder of Facebook—and Evelyn continues to lead and soar above us all. Some day, we will say we knew and were energized by Evelyn Berry on her way up and be grateful for the experience.

-Al Black

Evelyn Berry is a trans, Southern writer, editor, and educator. She's the author of Grief Slut (Sundress Publications, 2024). She's a recipient of a 2023 National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship and lives in Columbia, South Carolina.

Self-Portrait at Nineteen 

All summer, I worked shifts at Old Navy

& snorted molly from an iPhone screen

in the backseat of a car parked nowhere,

a happy heathen not yet grief-plundered.

Once, I was a boy unafraid to die.

I would swallow almost anything meant

to kill me if, at first, it got me high:

pills left over from surgery pilfered

from my parents’ medicine cabinet,

coffee cups of dark liquor, gas station

feasts, bounty of grease, sugar, cigarettes.

How else to parachute from the body?

Aliveness, this useless extravagance

I have wasted once before, but no more.

prodigal daughter 

what I know of sin, i learned in the sty

amid the swine, slurped mud and called it wine.

femme-fouled boy, faggot-spoiled sacrifice

offered at the altar and abandoned.

forgive my reckless want, lord, to belong

as more than soiled sacrament, fat sow

knife-split to gorge the prophets of gendered

violence. prayer, in their hands, a blade.

what do i know of penitence, patience,

except once the lord sent frenzied demons

into a drove of blameless pigs to drown?

how did we decide which beast to slaughter?

lord, i too am an impure animal.

i left home a son, return a daughter.

Eos 

After Mary Evelyn Pickering De Morgan

Once, the goddess of dawn cried out, forlorn,

her son cast into dirt beyond the walls of Troy,

Achilles’ sword drawn through his chest,

his soul gone, replaced with a feathered flock.

Her tears poured graceless as swans,

like a vase overflowing with morning dew

until grief bloomed new gardens.

Describe to me the weight of this.

Mourning replenishes the earth, ushers

Soil into rebirth, new river traced

from the boy’s doomed blue veins.

What is a song worth without its wound?

Let me, for once, taste paradise without the tinge of blood.

Let me glimpse the cusp of dawn without the flood of night.

The Decoy

            After John Collier

To be painted femme fatale, condemned fatal:

a woman’s beauty is a dangerous deception

in the hands of a man who demands

to own her like a plucked rose.

Let me be the decoy instead,

damsel in undress, glinting

luminescent like a knife

bound to my ankle.

SCETV and USC Press Celebrates Jazz Legend Marian McPartland with Book Launch Event at Koger Center for the Arts

South Carolina ETV and Public Radio (SCETV), in partnership with the University of South Carolina Press, is proud to announce a special event celebrating the launch of Shall We Play That One Together: The Life and Art of Jazz Piano Legend Marian McPartland, a biography by acclaimed jazz historian Paul de Barros. The event will take place on Oct. 1 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. in the Gallery on the second floor of the Koger Center for the Arts in Columbia.

This unique evening will feature live music from a jazz trio led by Mark Rapp of ColaJazz, light refreshments, hors d'oeuvres and a cash bar. Attendees will have the opportunity to meet author Paul de Barros, purchase signed copies of the book, and delve into the life and legacy of one of jazz’s most influential figures- Marian McPartland.

Paul de Barros, known for his extensive work in jazz, has crafted a compelling narrative that chronicles McPartland’s journey from the British novelty circuit to becoming a revered jazz pianist and the voice of jazz in America. Shall We Play That One Together: The Life and Art of Jazz Piano Legend Marian McPartland explores McPartland’s 30-year tenure on her NPR show, Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz, where she introduced tens of thousands of listeners to jazz music through interviews and performances with legendary artists.

The event will also mark the kickoff of a new season of ColaJazz Presents, a series dedicated to showcasing the rich jazz culture in South Carolina, featuring the ColaJazz Trio.

Shall We Play That One Together? Book Launch and Jazz Celebration

October 1, 2024, 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

The Gallery, 2nd Floor, Koger Center for the Arts, 1051 Greene Street, Columbia, SC

Free admission; books available for purchase onsite

This event is free and open to the public.

The University of South Carolina Press is a leading academic publisher, dedicated to advancing knowledge and scholarship through the publication of outstanding books across a range of disciplines, including history, literature, and the arts.

Al Black's Poetry of the People featuring Tre Fleming aka Poetré

This week's Poet of the People is Tre Fleming aka Poetré. Tre is an insightful poet and spoken word artist known professionally as Poetré. A multi-talented performer from Columbia; you should check him out the next time he hits the stage.

Poetré is a writer, comedian, poet, film producer, and podcaster from Columbia, SC. His works are inspired by his love of hip hop, mental health, social commentary, and self reflection. In 2024. He represented Columbia, SC as a part of the Tribe Slam team in the annual Southern Fried Poetry Competition in Florida, as well as competed in his first King Of The South Slam. He can be found on IG, and TikTok under @PoetreIsLife and for business inquiries at Poetreislife@gmail.com. 

____

LIVING OUT LOUD

If I have to stand onstage and scream, I will.

Yes, my people have come a long way, but still.

This is about community, living in unity.

My country, my world, not just you and me!

I am a voice for the voiceless, ones not in the room

Ones who have passed on, and ones in the womb.

I am justice for those who feel like it's just us.

And my Tribe will fight, even if it's nobody but us.

We are a generation of speakers, activist, and thinkers.

Not longer waiting for the cue from our leaders.

We are about that action, standing on business

Waiting on the revolution to be televised?

This is the internet!

We want it instant.

We will put our foot on your necks, until you show us respect

No matter race, gender, religion, I need us to shout.

Cause no longer will the minority be quiet.

WE ARE LIVING OUT LOUD!

FACES IN THE STREET 

The city is crowded, per usual.

Everyone busy in their own pursuit. 

A homeless man asks for spare change, if possible. 

A mother just got a call from her son in the hospital. A kid is lost. 

He knows where he is, but not in life.

A man texts a woman that's not his wife.

Someone is late for their first day of work.

Just trying to make sure there were no wrinkles in his shirt.

Someone is just out for exercise. 

Another person is smiling, but crying inside.

A couple is holding hands. They just got married.

A couple is holding hands. The wife just miscarried.

A girl scout is selling cookies, but people rarely stop.

A person is looking at a window of a store where they can't afford to shop.

A young teenager is looking for a place to stay.

The parents kicked him out because came out today.

A veteran is enjoying his first day home from war.

A lady holds her purse tight, cause she's been robbed before.

All these people around that I never get to meet.

Their stories untold. Just faces in the street.

BAD MEMORY

Remember when we first met?

It was on a day I'll probably forget.

It was raining,

Nope, it was sunny outside 

Things get foggy as the days go by.

Remember that time we laughed till we cried?

Couldn't remember what was so funny, no matter how hard I tried. 

Or how about that one trip you kept asking me to go?

I can't remember the name of the resort,

I just remember the snow.

Remember singing karaoke in front of everybody?

I forget what song we sang, but I remember you smiling.

Or when I tried comedy for the first time.

I remember you being so supportive, but what was the punchline?

Or what about the time we volunteered at the shelter?

I can't remember that one lady's name, but I'm glad we could help her.

I remember so many moments, I just forget some details.

I forget the exact words, 

I even forget to make this rhyme.

So I'll make up for it some time.

I remember what is most important, not names, days, places, or what we wear.

I just ask that when you remember those times, don't forget that I was there.

HEAVEN

She looks like heaven 

She's what angels sing about

She's what pastors scream and shout

She's my eternity

Cause being without her is hell to me

Those pair of eyes are paradise 

And her smile cause from somewhere high

She's the reason why I sing

When she laughs, an angel gets his wings

On my mind, she's my halo

Her love is Gospel, cause she says so

Her voice makes me rejoice when I hear it

When I'm down, she's my spirit

She came from somewhere far above,

She's the world, she's my savior, she is Love

Everyone knows it, the choir, the deacon, the ushers, the reverend 

I'll sacrifice everything, 

Cause she looks like heaven 

FIRST LOVE

The first time I fell in love was with a woman who loved other men before me.

Yet I was her first. 

It took me a while to build myself up to meet her.

Even though she had fallen for me way before I could greet her.

See I was nothing but love.

I had to form into an entity from God before we could meet.

Because the pain that she went through to meet me was the gift with no receipt.

The first woman that held me in her arms was the first woman I loved. 

I didn't pick a mother.

I was a choice she made and planned for.

And she prepared me for the women I would love.

What she did was traumatized me from light skinned girls!

Not, I'm just playing.

She taught me what love was through how she loved me and my siblings and to how she loved strangers. 

She showed what caring about someone means in the late night phone calls, the 2 am Emergency room calls, one call from jail, the cosign on a student loan, the "hey I love you" texts at 11:42 on a Tuesday just because. 

She taught me how to walk. Walk away from a fight that you don't need to win, walk away from a toxic relationship, walk away from a lie, and walk away with my head held high.

She taught me how to talk. Like literally talk. I could read before preschool. I am able to articulate what I want, how I want, to who I want. No just talking. She taught me how to speak. She taught me how to say something.

She taught me unconditional love. 

She taught me was hustling was.

She taught me how to save. 

And who not to save.

She never pushed my father out of my life.

She proved she'd never disrespect my wife.

I can never thank her enough.

And even though the roads been rough,

She's still my first love.