Table of Contents
Foreword Natalie Baszile 1
Introduction Dr. Analena Hope Hassberg 7
1 Those Winter Sundays by Robert Hayden 13
2 Everyone Beneath Their Own Vine and Fig Tree: A Remembering in Seven Parts by Michael Twitty 15
3 Handed the Rain by Ed Roberson 21
4 Writing Queen Sugar by Natalie Baszile 25
5 Excerpt from Black and White: The Way I See It by Richard Williams 37
6 Resilience and Reinvention with Stanley Hughes and Linda Leach 43
7 Little Farm, Big Dreams with Kamal Bell 55
8 Black to the Land by Leah Penniman 61
9 Cutting greens by Lucille Clifton 67
10 The Last Plantation: The USDA's Racist Operating System by Pete Daniel 69
11 Father and Daughter with Harper and Ashley Armstrong 91
12 To the Fig Tree on 9th and Christian by Ross Gay 99
13 On Top of Moon Mountain with Brenae Royal 105
14 Money Talk with Clif Sutton and Dexter Faison 115
15 Barking by Lenard D. Moore 123
16 Dispossessed: Their Family Bought Land One Generation After Slavery. The Reels Brothers Spent Eight Years in Jail for Refusing to Leave It by Lizzie Presser 125
17 Louisiana Daughters: A Conversation with Lalita Tademy and Margaret Wilkerson Sexton 147
18 Queen Sugar, Chapter 10 by Natalie Baszile 161
19 Frame by Robin Coste Lewis 167
20 America at the Crossroads: A History of Enslavement and Land by Clyde Ford 171
21 Field Day at the Hill Place with Odis Hill 185
22 Equal Ground with Willie Earl Nelson Sr. and Sons 193
23 Fearless by Tim Seibles 205
24 Four Days in Alaskan Farm School with Melony Edwards 209
25 No Better Life with the Blueforts 217
26 Ancestral Vibrations Guide Our Connection to the Land by Jim Embry 227
27 Remember by Joy Harjo 239
28 Family Ties with Esmeralda and Antonio Sandoval 243
29 How to Make Rain by Kevin Young 251
30 Miss Rose's Dirty Rice by Natalie Baszile 253
31 A New Country with Dorcas Young 257
32 Raised and Rooted with Deric Harper 263
33 Making Space with Moretta Browne 271
34 Call Me by My Name by Harryette Mullen 275
35 Wheel of Fortune with Martha Calderon 277
36 Exceeding the "Yes" with Marvin Frink 283
37 Swarm by Tonya Foster 291
38 A Brief History of Tobacco by Natalie Baszile 293
39 After Tobacco with the Wrights 297
40 Yellowjackets by Yusef Komunyakaa 301
41 Home Games with Kellye Walker and Werten Bellamy 303
42 Butter by Elizabeth Alexander 311
43 A Love Letter to Future Generations by Naima Penniman 313
44 Inside Queen Sugar: Jason Wilborn Reflects on His Years in the Queen Sugar Writers' Room by Natalie Baszile 319
45 The Boudin Trail by Natalie Baszile 327
Black Harvest Fund 335
Acknowledgments 337
Notes 339
Credits 345
Contributors 347
Photographs 349