Author Archives: Shannon Carriger

This thirty foot sculpture titled Maman (Mother of Spiders) by Louise Bourgeois once hovered over the entrance to Crystal Bridges, a museum in Arkansas. It was an ominous welcome to a place filled with light and art and brilliant expressions of humanity. Gorgeous and menacing, tall and terrible, symbolizing protection and venom, it has recentlyContinue reading “High School Horror”

In the last week, Michael and I have been planning a trip for later this summer. We never really took a honeymoon–a whirlwind trip to East Tennessee in 2019, while beautiful, was so packed with things to do that it wasn’t the rest we’d hoped for. So this year we will road trip to GeorgiaContinue reading “Accept It All”

My morning commute takes me past two open spaces. The first, a field filled at different times of year with prairie dogs and squirrels, the occasional fox, and deer, is a wonder just dropped down to my left. Slightly lower than the street, it’s a miniature valley between houses, where fawns and does gather againstContinue reading “The Phantom & the Fear”

I’ve never had what you would call elegant hands. My palms are broad–so much so that I can’t wear most bangle bracelets–and my fingers are short and squat. They are strong hands, though, and they look exactly like my father’s. When I type or write, I see him in my motions. His hands on aContinue reading “My Father’s Daughter”

The first time I ever heard The Smiths has to be in the pivotal and also wildly damaging Pretty in Pink. Duckie flicks cards into a hat as “Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want This Time” plays melancholically–as though it could play any other way–in the background. I didn’t know it atContinue reading “Come Armageddon Come”

“This, Too, Is a Lesson” The murder women speak of Ukraine.It isn’t here, the terror, but it is real and true and criminal. They tellof disaster preparedness kits, evangelists selling buckets of apocalypse soup, the unbearable hopelessness of a flag on a profile picture or a retweeted show of support. I am walking outside onContinue reading ““This, Too, Is a Lesson””

First grade was tough; I’d gone to a different school for kindergarten, so I didn’t know any of the students and the school was bigger. Or maybe it just seemed that way to a tow-headed six-year-old. My teacher Mrs. Harris wore floral dresses and comfortable shoes and had tightly permed white hair. She was kindContinue reading “Tough Acting Animals”

My grad school buddy Matthew Webber, a musician and writer and all around good dude, suggested I use this space on occasion to write about my record collection. To that end, today I want to tell you about the first time I fell in love. From the first time I saw “Fight For Your RightContinue reading “I Put My Boot Down: A Love Story”

“All my life, and it has not come to / any more than this: / beauty and terror.” –from Blue Pastures, Mary Oliver Each morning I wake to the certainty of my husband in bed next to me. His frame is long, his breathing steady. I am anchored by the fact of him. The alarmsContinue reading “Beauty and Terror”

My first publication came at age nine–a sternly worded letter to the editor of my local paper admonishing the high school boys who had, the night before, stolen pumpkins from the porch of our house. I remember hearing them run up outside, stealing the pumpkins, and smashing them in the street out front. Ours wasContinue reading “Out into the World”