

Terry Godbey reads from her poetry collection, Hold Still.

Vanessa Blakeslee reads “Welcome, Lost Dogs,” from her debut story collection, Train Shots.

A small antique shop built of brown, weathered clapboard. Inside, for sale, an old typewriter. Caught in its dusky roller, a sheet of paper with a poem by James Wright typed onto it. But no: on second glance, no paper at all.

There were several theories on how the Waterheads got that way. The theories I remember, or believe I remember, ranged far and wide. The Waterheads were inbred, and they came from Arkansas or somewhere else people thought of as having a lot of inbreds. Or maybe they had been too close to a nuclear test.