StateoftheOzarks Weekly

Stories Found & Told

BEEN THINKIN’ ABOUT… STORIES FOUND & TOLD. “These are the classic monster movies, like Frankenstein,” Dustin is saying, pointing to several shelves full of DVDs. “Over there, the formation of Western civilization. Here, action films. There, horror. Here, documentaries.” Associate editor Dustin Burkett is giving me a tour of his film room. In the new…

StateoftheOzarks Weekly

Poetry & Fists

BEEN THINKIN’ ABOUT… POETRY & FISTS. “Levitt’s swinging right caught him by the cheek-bone and he staggered, driven back by the force of the larger man’s onslaught.” — Louis L’Amour, Where the Long Grass Blows L’Amour was “America’s Favorite Storyteller.” I know that because those words are printed on the cover of all his books.…

StateoftheOzarks Weekly

Winter, Late

BEEN THINKIN’ ABOUT… THE WINTER, LATE. “Do you ever have memories that are not quite your own? Moments in the mind’s eye that feel so real, but have never been a part of your own past?” The house still stands on the hill and it is late winter but the air is strange and warm.…

StateoftheOzarks Weekly

Water, Ink & Stone

BEEN THINKIN’ ABOUT… WATER, INK, & STONE. The early rains came down again, like they always do this time of year. The grass greens. The daffodil blooms, reminder that no matter the crazy outrage of the day, there is solace in new life, again, and again. It seems the world begins anew each year with…

StateoftheOzarks Weekly

Our Daily Bread

BEEN THINKING ABOUT… OUR DAILY BREAD. “Give us this day our daily bread….” The rains were heavy that spring of my 16th year, and the gooseberry brambles plentiful with green fruit. Dark skies blocked out the May sun and I kept my worn-out green flannel shirt close by, wet-tinged breeze still biting as I threw…