Poet Laureate Linda Parsons’ Play ‘Decoration Day’ Is a Pathway to Light & Reconciliation

I got to know Knoxville’s fifth and current Poet Laureate Linda Parsons through a picture I took for Inside of Knoxville when she read her poem “Beyond” with the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra (I had an amazing recording of the event and am still wrecked that my audio cable failed that day). Parsons and I recently chatted about the position of Poet Laureate, an American Semiquincentennial project that will debut in July, and her latest play.

Parson’s Decoration Day, produced by Theatre 23 and staged at the Borderland Playhouse, runs through May 31. After our conversation, I went to see Decoration Day on opening weekend and spent a few days unpacking this moving story of a family looking for light and reconciliation.

But first, what exactly is a Poet Laureate?

Representing the Written and Spoken Word for Knoxville

Parsons told me that the Poet Laureate is “a representative for the city, for the written and spoken word … about our place in time in this part of Tennessee.” For Parsons, poetry “connects us to each other, to the natural world, and to the past as well as helping us pay attention to what’s happening in our lives.” Her term as Poet Laureate will continue through June 30, 2027 when her successor is named. Leslie covered the announcement of Parsons as Poet Laureate in June 2025.

Knoxville’s Poet Laureate is selected by nomination of potential candidates. Poets can also ask someone to nominate them if they feel they have the credentials for the position. Candidates submit their work through an online form with their literary resume and work samples. The position is a partnership between the City of Knoxville and the Arts & Culture Alliance. The Laureate, once named, plans and completes projects around the written word for the city.

Among Parsons’ many other initiatives, she will present Declaration: I am Tennessee, connected to the United States’ 250th Anniversary. Working with the Knoxville Writers Guild and the East Tennessee Historical Society, Parsons has created a document from 30 selected writers discussing how Tennessee has shaped them, including personal essays, poetry and more.

Seven readers, including Mary Pom Claiborne, Jan Loveday Dickens, Donna Doyle, Bethany Lemons, R.B. Morris, Nancy Brennan Strange (with songs), Todd Steed and Parsons will present at the East Tennessee History Center on Thursday, July 16th from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. The event is unticketed and free. Additional readers, such as Yassin Terou, will be reading at other events in the future.

Decoration Day and Finding the Breadcrumbs that Lead Us Home

Parsons writes, both in her poetry and plays, about family: their relationships, struggles, the things that haunt them, and how they communicate (or don’t). She explained that much of her writing is a study in “how they confront their issues both within the family and individually, and how they resolve those issues.”

Reconciliation has become foundational in Parsons’ poetry and plays. She posed essential questions to me: “How do we essentially save ourselves? How do we achieve some form of reconciliation, both within the family and within ourselves? To find peace? I don’t really want to say forgiveness; I think compassion is more on target than forgiveness.” 

Decoration Day explores these themes through the Upper East Tennessee Rankin Family’s observation of Decoration Day, most commonly practiced in Southern Appalachia around Memorial Day weekend.  The timing is perfect for the play. Families visit graves of their loved ones to clean and decorate the burial site. It is a practice that still exists with many East Tennessee families, including my own.

Decoration Day was accepted to this year’s Appalachian Festival of Plays and Playwrights at Barter’s Smith Theatre in Abingdon, VA. Playwrights and directors work with actors and then spend seven to eight hours of rehearsal time for a staged reading at the end of the festival week. She said the process strengthened the play and resulted in a new scene. Parson’s director (and co-artistic director) was Sarah Van Deusen.

The director for the Borderland production is Steven O’Shea. Parsons said that O’Shea “has been so excellent and intuitive. And insightful to work with. It’s just been a real lesson and a joy for me to watch him work and to work with him.”

In the final moments of Decoration Day, a character threatens to break a window, an unnecessary action as choices and outside forces have shattered the Rankin family well enough. Parson’s seventh production and 10th play is a deep dive into the complicated waters of a family dealing with consequences of trauma, some chosen and others forced by external players. As Kate says, they need to “find the breadcrumbs that lead us home.” In fashion true to life, that journey towards home and light is neither perfect nor easy. 

Decoration Day opens with protagonist Kate Hughes, played by Charity Combs, returning to her home in Upper East Tennessee after being dragged “pillar to post” by her mother. Parsons said that Combs brings a “wonderful mix of of strength and vulnerability and of searching for meaning in her life” to the role. Cities that filled my younger years are referenced throughout, and I felt like I was coming home as well. 

As Parsons notes, parents and children both bring their baggage, and 30-year-old Kate is no different. As she returns home to help her aunt, Susan Jackson’s June (Bug) Rankin, on Decoration Day, a mystery involving her mother Cordie’s ring is revealed to the audience. Cordie has recently passed away but still appears in the play. Because of the family’s dynamics, Kate’s life has been forever changed, causing her to abandon her childhood dreams. As the play progresses, you wonder where Kate will wind up. 

Amanda Wasinger’s Cordie Hughes, described by Parsons as a “whirling dervish,” and her husband Boyd’s relationship is marked by a fiery instability that affects Kate’s life. Veteran actor (and veteran) Steve Trigg brings Boyd to life. Cordie’s story is told through a series of non-linear flashbacks that reveal the full mystery involving a childhood accident that creates a domino effect of trauma. 

Parsons, a self-professed Tarantino fan, said, “you have to pay attention because things are not happening on a time frame. That’s how memory works. You’re seeing memories that the characters have out of time.” Lighting designer Tom Eubanks’ palette of color will help you follow the pathway. Conversations happen across time as past and present intertwine, particularly between Kate and Cordie as both try to reconcile what has happened.

Boyd is returning home after 20 years in prison, and Aunt June, the “grounding force” and matriarch of the family, is committed to helping him reestablish himself. Aunt June knows all the family secrets and shows deep compassion as she helps navigate the other characters towards home and the light they are seeking. She also serves as a mother figure for Kate. June’s extraordinary strength is revealed against a backdrop of her own personal tragedies. Like many matriarchs, she carries her grief alone, and Susan Jackson’s monologue near the end is one of the reasons tissue boxes are placed around theatre seating.

Parsons further explained that “Kate is having to confront the fact that not only is her mother dead, but her father is returning home, and she’s pretty angry about that.” The path to home, light and reconciliation is spurred on by Boyd’s return, accompanied by a fellow ex-con, Nickel Widner, played by Kyle Badgley. Nickel is both comedy relief and antagonist. Another character who “stirs things up” is Brother Carter (Brian Wasinger), whose actions in the past lead to one of the core traumas that affect the family. Both of the characters are “change agents” that create fractures, forcing characters to confront their own brokenness.

Parsons used a metaphor that helped me to understand the trauma and resulting reconciliation sought by the four main characters: Kintsugi, the Japanese art of mending broken pottery with resin and gold (or silver), with the “idea that the scars and broken places make you stronger.” The characters experience “movement toward unity and toward understanding, toward peace and toward resolution. They’re changed from the brokenness you experience. When you’re able to come to a place where you feel you can put the pieces back together again, you’re stronger for that.”

Set against the backdrop of the Holston River (another reason the play resonates with me; I grew up on the Holston), Parsons said the characters are “all moving toward recovering home, both the physical place and their place within it as a family group and individually.” The Holston River, without spoiling a major plot point, is the seventh character in the play and looms over everything. Parsons is also a fan of fairy tales and said that the scenes are all “breadcrumbs leading you home.” Like Kintsugi pottery, the cracked lines form the strength of the Rankin family.

Parsons closed by saying, “the play addresses some hard family issues, but who doesn’t have hard family issues?” 

Seeing Decoration Day at the Borderland Playhouse

As you go see Decoration Day, each character’s movement towards light, home and hope is a powerful commentary on how reconciliation can (hopefully) be found in broken relationships, but just as importantly, how we reconcile our own internal conflicts that result from past trauma. Productions continue May 22-24 and May 29-31 at Borderland Playhouse (802 Sevier Avenue).

A quick suggestion to help with the ongoing Sevier Avenue streetscape project. Very reasonable paid parking is available immediately behind Borderland. I would also recommend getting there early to support the Sevier Avenue businesses by taking in a meal or dessert. Visible progress is being made on the streetscape and the SoKno Art Trail project, and I’m excited to see how these enhance going to see a play at Borderland.

Tickets are available at Theatre 23’s website. I would recommend picking up a ticket soon as this past Sunday afternoon’s matinee was nearly sold out.