Where I’m From

I’m from Lincoln logs,
from Matchbox cars and Archie comics.
I am from Little River running through the neighbor’s backyard.
From slippery rocks, muddy water and minnows.
I am from a fort in the woods near Houchens.
From honeysuckle,
poison ivy,
and the roses we stole from Mr. Wiggins’ garden.

I’m from leather saddles, polished like mahogany,
from alfalfa fields that grew green like money.
I’m from ‘Some enchanted evening,’
and from ‘Don’t ask, just do it!’
I’m from ‘Five’ll get ya ten old Macky’s back in town’ booming from my parents’ Magnavox

I’m from Miriam and Joe,
from Memphis, from a West Virginia coal town,
and from the city that built the bomb.
I’m from the Shinnston tornado,
from books and ink and newspapers.
I’m from answering the coroner’s call at midnight:
‘Tell your father I left a body for him in the cooler.’

I am from the archives,
from courthouse records,
the census, headstones and old city directories.

I am sentences and paragraphs and pages from a hundred ancestors. And hundred more.

Jennifer P. Brown is co-founder, publisher and editor of Hoptown Chronicle. You can reach her at editor@hoptownchronicle.org. She spent 30 years as a reporter and editor at the Kentucky New Era. She is a co-chair of the national advisory board to the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, governing board president for the Kentucky Historical Society, and co-founder of the Kentucky Open Government Coalition.