From the Chapter 16 archive: If there’s not enough time to read, why am I working so hard to send another book into the world?
Read more
Planting Trees Whose Shade We May Never Enjoy
A writer gardens through an existential crisis
In Essays
The Sucker
You can learn a lot from a poker game
I was 18 and about to be the first Vargo to leave Detroit for any reason other than war, thanks to a student loan, a Pell grant, and the gift of an academic probation program that gave kids like me one semester to prove our scholarly worth or go back to wherever it was we came from. I felt so smart.
Read more
Spinning through Knoxville
On seeing Knoxville’s past and present
I watch the TikTok videos of a man in Knoxville. He roller skates — backwards — across Market Square plaza, inside and outside the Convention Center, and down Volunteer Landing that snakes parallel to the Tennessee River. He skates down the brightly graffitied Strong Street alley. Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy, Mercy Me” plays as he skims past the images and murals on the alley walls. The pictures swirl into swaths of neon colors like a psychedelic dream.
Read more
Are You Visiting?
I’d never seen a mosque in the South.
On Eid-ul-Azha, the Feast of the Sacrifice, I knew no one in Nashville. I decided to wear my white shalwar kameez to commemorate the festival. What else could be done?
Read more
The Way It Ends
Mom and I had just gotten to the really good part
She was the person in the world who cared the most for me and the one person whose love would be unchanged by my mistakes. Her embrace was the warmth of acceptance, and without it, I feared I would break.
Read more
Layers
When love isn’t love
Getting to know a person is like digging through the core of the Earth. Sometimes you find interesting and complex layers; other times, you hit an empty cavity that’s waiting to devour you whole.
Read more