How do words get their meanings?Is there a natural connection between namesand the bits of the world those words pick out?Phillip Barron's tiny poems in Bright Leaf explore the connections between a place, its history, and its names. The poems' titles come from names of places, historical actors, and events significant to the founding and history of Durham, North Carolina,a post-industrial city that once was a center of global tobacco production.Each word of the poem uses letters only as many times as they appear in the title. Unfolding from the titles, Bright Leaf's poems become lexical sculptures of Durham's sounds and meanings.