A Voice for the Unhoused

And a Recent Poem

Dandeline photographed by Ray Zimmerman.

Unhoused Chattanoogans tell their stories

The June meeting of the Chattanooga Writers’ Guild featured a showing of Mark J. Anderson’s documentary, Chattown Chatta: Our Homeless. Anderson interviewed homeless people and asked them to tell their stories. A view of a tent city appears in the background in several interviews, and all were conducted on the streets where the people live.

One comment stood out, obvious as it may seem. Every homeless person has their own story. One interviewee said, “We are not all the same. Listening to the stories, I discovered that homelessness is largely homegrown. Several of these people were born and raised in Chattanooga. Some mentioned coming from Knoxville.

The documentary includes twelve interviews. The book with the same title has 20. Anderson recently presented his film at Barking Legs Theater in Chattanooga. News 9, a local television channel, has a story about that event here.

Chattanooga has several missions for the homeless. Thanks to Mark for allowing our unhoused population to tell their stories. His other recent book is Rescuing Jesus from American Christianity: In His Own Words.

A Recent Poem

I wrote this poem at a workshop Saturday, but it stretches the boundaries of the prompt, which was to list some characteristics of an elderly person we know and create a poem. The person in this poem is fictional.

Granny's Cookies

Grany keeps her shop emaculate,
she says "Clenliness is next to Godliness.
We can't have dust ruining the cookies." 

Granny skips the floral prints.
She prefers buisness suits, 
and cash on the barrelhead. 

The customers love her cookies. 
Just the other day a man said, 
"This cookie is perfect."

"I'm glad you like it," she replied,
"It's sure to collect all the data
and send it to your unmarked building."

Poster Sale

I am pleased to announce a sale of my poetry posters, also known as Broadsides, on Wednesday, June 25, at Rev Coffee and Books in Hixson, Tennessee, from 5:30 to 6:30 PM. Ray has republished four 11” by 17” posters, each featuring a poem and one of my photographs. I will read the four poems at 5:30, and sell the posters following the brief reading. I will also offer customers a free poster if they purchase my book.