Tennessee Camp Meeting, 1982

by Stephen M. Sanders

I sat on a weathered, wooden bench
in the midst of fear-moistened believers
hanging themselves
on the evangelist’s words:

“—it ends right here for all of us—”

the drinkable air laced
by the smell of damp soil and pines,
the oranged heat of Coleman lanterns,
the throbbing rapture of listeners,
and those words
springing from the front:

“—and where are you going to be? Do not listen
to those who cry for tomorrow and fear nothing!”

I see, even now, our fathers crying “Save me!’
and stumbling through the crowded aisles
in hopes that it would not be
too late—

“in this very minute, they, too, like us,
are breathing their last!”

stoked fears clamped
my hands to my grandfather’s arm;

He, too, would be taken away.

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Stephen M. Sanders is an assistant professor of English at South Plains College in Levelland, Texas. He has had poems included in publications including Pacifica Literary Review, Penumbra Literary & Art Magazine, and the Austin International Poetry Festival di-vêrsé-city anthology. His first novel Passe-Partout was published in 2019 (Monument Place Books).