Readings From Salvation South

Emma Galloway Stephens reads her powm “The Dogwood Years.”

Emma Galloway Stephens is a neurodivergent poet and professor from the Appalachian foothills of South Carolina. Her poems have appeared in Red Branch Review, The Christian Century, Door is a Jar, Salvation South, and many others. She's the author of No Billboard Gospel (Solum Literary Press, 2026).

Caleb Johnson reads his poems “In Praise of the Blackberry.” “Atop a Ridge in Boone,” and “Our Son Has Reminded Me.”

Caleb Johnson is the author of the novels Telegraph Road (Hub City Press, August 2027) and Treeborne (Picador), which was named an honorable mention for the Southern Book Prize. His poetry has been published in Appalachian Journal, Birmingham Poetry Review, The Hopper, and is forthcoming elsewhere. His nonfiction appears widely in magazines and newspapers, and has been cited in The Best American Essays. He teaches at Appalachian State University.

Stan Lake reads four poems from his debut collection, A Toad in a Glass Jar: “A Toad in a Glass Jar,” “I Hope Heaven Is a Wild Place,” “What Weight Does a Tree Carry?” and “Long Before the War.”

Stan Lake is a writer, photographer, and filmmaker living in Pfafftown, North Carolina, with his wife Jess and their house full of animals. A veteran of the North Carolina Army National Guard, he often draws on his deployment to Iraq and his love of Southern wildlife in his work. His poetry collection, A Toad in a Glass Jar (2026), was published by Dead Reckoning Collective.

Carrie Green reads her poem "Somewhere, Summer."

Carrie Green is the author of Studies of Familiar Birds: Poems (Able Muse Press, 2020) and Millie MacAdoo Takes Note: A Mystery in Verse, forthcoming from Able Muse Press. She is the winner of the 2025 Brink Literary Journal Award for Hybrid Writing and the 2025 Kentucky Foundation for Women Writers Prize. Her poems and visual poems have appeared or are forthcoming in American Life in Poetry, Verse Daily, Terrain, Tupelo Quarterly, Bellingham Review, Shenandoah, and elsewhere.

Hear Charles Livesay read three poems: “My Mother’s Son,” “Hawks Won’t Wait,” and “Crappie Season Again.“

Charles Richard Livesay is a teacher from Knoxville, Tennessee. He has been published in Strange Horizons, Oh Reader, Pictura Journal, Rat’s Ass Review, and oddball magazine, among others. He watches birds, reads books, and sometimes forgets to take out his earbuds before he falls asleep. When that happens, Buck Owens haunts his dreams.

Hear Diana Keough read her monthly "Between Sundays" column for July 2026: "Does God Really Have a Plan?"

Diana Keough is an award-winning journalist and professor of journalism at the University of Georgia. She is the creator of Not From a Nice Family, a memoir podcast that will be released by Audible on September 17, 2026.

Heath Gibson reads his short story "Rising Tide."

Heath Gibson is the author of young adult novels—Gigged (2010, Flux) and Burn (2012, Flux). His latest work, “Not Much of a Choice” appears in Deep South Magazine. Gibson holds an MFA from Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia. He splits time between Atlanta and Oldmeldrum, Scotland, and fills his life with all his little obsessions—teaching his daughter how to deliver a punchline, cycling, and trying to create soups that will make people believe in magic.

A poem by Noreen Ocampo, read by the author. Noreen Ocampo is a Filipino American writer and poet from metro Atlanta. She is the author of the chapbooks There Are No Filipinos in Mississippi (Porkbelly Press, 2025) and Not Flowers (Variant Literature, 2022), and her work can also be found in Frontier Poetry, Baltimore Review, The Margins, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Mississippi.

A sneaky daddy, a rescuer aunt, and a local woman who watches through the diner window turn into sharp looks at small-town Alabama life: a collection of three poems by Rachel Nix.

Rachel Nix is a queer writer and editor for Screen Door Review. Her own work has appeared in such journals as Sundog Lit, Up the Staircase Quarterly, and The West Review, among others. She resides in Northwest Alabama, where pine trees outnumber people rather nicely.

Watching a table of older friends across a restaurant, the author of Salvation South's monthly "Between Sundays" column, Diana Keough, gets a jolt of fear about where time is taking her—and wonders how to grow old with open hands instead of a clenched jaw.

Diana Keough is an award-winning journalist and professor of journalism at the University of Georgia. She is the creator of Not From a Nice Family, a memoir podcast that will be released by Audible on September 17, 2026.