"The adult DeShawn lives a high, artistic, and promiscuous life in San Francisco. But when he's called back to his cramped southern hometown for his uncle's funeral, it's inevitable that he'll be hit by flashbacks of handsome, doomed neighbors and sweltering Sunday services. Amidst prickly reminders of his childhood, DeShawn ponders family, church, and the men in his life, prompting the question: Who deserves love? Since I Laid My Burden Down is a raw, funny, and uninhibited novella that traces a queer black man's sexual and artistic awakenings as he stumbles-often painfully, sometimes joyously-down memory lane."--