East Tennessee taught me what home town meant and how tranquil a lay in the grass could be

Wooden barbwire fences up Raccoon valley roads
nestled between the Cumberland plateau  
and the Great Smoky Mountains
lies the sweet tea Tennessee valley i call home.
 
lush rolling green hills out in Norris numbered a handful of days in my youth
to the bicycle tread mark city streets of South Knoxville.
high school passenger car crashes on Sharps ridge,
running up and down alley ways between Hiawassee and Chickamagua avenue.
 
car bent Whittle springs laundry mat poles  
perched after middle school waiting.
gun shots ring out in Parkridge nights that lulled us to sleep.
Island Home river breezes where James White parkway dropped dead since i was a boy;
riding two seater go carts at the dead ended highway until the cops showed up.
 
Heniretta drive backyard porches held early birthday parties,
suicide memory family members.
Dry Gap Pike was my 30 minute pedaled destination for Love.
the French broad sweeps soundly just a stones throw from my fathers house off Thorngrove pike.
Fountain city walks around the duck pond and the park held our huge family reunions that have long since faded as the wind & clouds blow away photographs.
 
bittersweet is this city of Knoxville and state of Tennessee that i live.
these mountains are my lullaby
and this heart of the valley is an attempt at an honest life worth living.
if i ever wonder abroad
please lead me back to home, here to my East Tennessee.