It's a major award!

Yup. Exactly.

Okay, maybe I shouldn’t be so silly, but I just couldn’t resist making that reference. What can I say? I’m giddy.

I found out that my poem, “Of Barbecue and Blood,” won third prize in the Southern Writers Symposium Emerging Writers Award. I was floored when I found out. I’m looking forward to planning a trip to North Carolina for the Symposium, and meeting my fellow winners, as well as all the other writers in attendance.

“Of Barbecue and Blood” is an abecedarian sonnet, and it discusses both food and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Those opposed to blood or horror movies might want to look away, because I’m posting the poem below.

Of Barbecue and Blood

Everyone knows it’s all about the sausage; that’s the good stuff,

going, then gone at the market, but most people relish

ignorance of how it’s made. I envision the hook, a metal J,

keeping up slabs of meat, and then a full

memory of Leatherface, Pam hung up like pork, and then

once that’s done, stuffed in the freezer, as though the health department might stop,

question the family about their hygiene practices. Celluloid horror

shaped my first opinions about Texas. Maybe that’s why when I set

up shop here, I went vegetarian for four years, no beef, no chicken kiev.

What years I wasted, fearing meat, but there’s only so much cheese-filled Tex-Mex

you can eat before you have to try the good stuff. They started me on Kruez,

Artz, then Southside, and learned a thing or two about sauce and rub.

Calm down, memory of monster movies. I’m not going home empty-handed.