Years pass by and leave things unaltered. The same narrow, red roads run through cotton- and cornfields. The same time- grayed cabins send up threads of smoke from their red- clay chimneys, doorways, and china- berry and crape- myrtle blossoms to drop gay petals on little half- clothed black children.
—Julia Peterkin (1880–1961), “Ashes,” from Green Thursday: Stories by Julia Peterkin, first published in 1924.