The Song Starts There
Han VanderHart’s visceral verses weave together memories of country living, intimate relationships, and the confounding complexities of identity in the American South.
Han VanderHart. poetry National Poetry Month poems. Queer poetry from the South.
ARS POETICA WITH BIRTH LEDGER AND CRAWFISH
I was born in the country; my heart
sunk its roots down deep through
the garden, cornfields, creek—
the crawfish in their rocky dark,
the chickens dust bathing in the
yard. The animals were close:
raccoons, possums, fox, deer,
knocking at the back door
where my mother left food for the cats.
When we moved: my roots tore.
Everything begins in childhood.
The song starts there, the poem.
It was a spring morning when I was born.
It was May. My mother’s hair was long.
The animals and earth were waking up,
preparing for a summer riot.
The moon was new
Han VanderHart. poetry National Poetry Month poems. Queer poetry from the South.
Ars Poetica With Lye Soap
with a debt to Lucille Clifton
fat from the hog
rendered over fire
mixed with fume and bite
by rubber gloved hands
and when the aproned mother
has poured the soap
into creamy wrinkles you’d think
the sting is gone
but when set and cured
it still takes from your skin
never mind
the tender inside
of your mouth
why did even our soap
contain lye
what is the poem
underneath this poem
ARS POETICA WITH FISHHOOKS, TWO LAKES, AND A LURE
the boys I sat beside in school wore fishhooks
on the brims of their baseball caps
and they were right to—because fishing
is something that catches you
even the polluted lake by my grandmother’s house
even the poisoned lake by your grandmother’s house
the fish dead and floating, morning of your cousin’s wedding
the color and glitter of lures, their oily feel
how easily a lure tears
how much a lure can cost
how I would play with a lure by itself as a child
all by its shiny self
ARS POETICA WITH DEER HUNTING OF TWO KINDS
Some go on foot, following the deer
looking for signs: these are the travelers.
These know most by movement, by following.
My father was the second kind, who walks
to a camouflaged stand or a blind
in a tree, waits until his limbs freeze,
thermos of coffee and silence; from here
you can hear every bird, crunch of boot
of the trackers, snap of branch, listen
to the dawn crescendo of the twelve-point buck
as it comes crashing through the woods straight
to the grassy clearing where you’ve positioned
yourself in good light and loneliness.
NOW THAT I’VE LOVED YOU THROUGH THE CALENDAR YEAR
and the seasons we still have
despite the warm November days
I know I miss you the most in December
the autumn leaves still gathered
in the arms of the trees
as though they can’t let go
as when I turned to you
in the field of the bed
asking a question
and you could not know
how bleating the words were
in my throat, my mouth
as I’ve heard the lambs cry
after their mothers
in the spring, the goose down
floating on the green
and there are some kinds of trees
that never let their leaves go
and most lambs are separated
from their mothers
but what tethers me is the memory
of your eyes in that moment
how soft they were
soft as a summer night
LOVE POEM WITH HORSES
I miss the soft gate of your mouth
the river’s changing shade of your eyes
looking into them like a girl barefoot
on the Rappahannock’s bank
& your silent places—your culverts,
the pond you’ve let the beavers dam,
the long grasses and the water oak
blown down you left as sculpture
to the wind’s desire
forget the location of our bodies on a map—
you are the place
where the horses are running
for the pleasure of their legs in motion
their manes and tails whipping
mouths open to each other
Han VanderHart is a queer writer living in Durham, North Carolina, under the pines. Their second poetry collection,Larks, winner of the 2024 Hollis Summers Poetry Prize, is forthcoming in April 2025 from Ohio University Press. Han is also the author of What Pecan Light (Bull City Press, 2021) and has essays and poetry published inKenyon Review, The American Poetry Review, The Rumpus, AGNI, and elsewhere. Han hosts the Of Poetry Podcast and alongside Amorak Huey co-edits the poetry press River RiverBooks.