Exploring the Connecting Power and Beauty of Language with Hannah V. Warren

Hey, everyone. I enjoyed hosting Hannah V Warren on the podcast today. She’s a poet, translator, and keen observer of life. She's the author of the poetry collection Slaughterhouse for Old Wives' Tales and two chapbooks. Hannah is a creative force, full of originality, surprise, and depth, and it was such an honor to have her on the show.  

Hannah shared her journey into poetry, which began in rural South Mississippi, where she described having few opportunities to engage with poetry. It wasn’t until college, when she took an Introduction to Poetry class with Catherine Pierce, that she discovered contemporary voices like Natasha Trethewey. Trethewey’s work, deeply rooted in the South, inspired Hannah to explore her experiences and identity through poetry. She pursued an MFA at the University of Kansas, where she delved into grotesque and speculative poetry, eventually returning to the South to confront her roots in her writing.  

Her work is deeply influenced by Southern Gothic themes, examining the ecological, cultural, and gendered landscapes of the Deep South. Hannah’s poetry challenges patriarchal norms and old wives’ tales, blending personal experience with natural history and folklore. She talked about how her unexpected move to Irondale, Alabama, has enriched her writing as she engages with the region’s ecological diversity and complex history. To connect with her new surroundings, she founded *Aesthetic Shock*, a home-based poetry series that brings poets and audiences together to discuss landscape and place.  

Hannah shared insights into her debut collection, Slaughterhouse for Old Wives' Tales, which weaves personal narratives, natural history, and Southern folklore together. The title reflects her desire to “slaughter” harmful traditions while celebrating women's resilience. She read a powerful note from the book, inviting readers into a deeply personal and transformative conversation.  

We also touched on her latest work, Hurricane Pastoral, a manuscript exploring Gothic landscapes in the Deep South and Germany. Hannah compared the religiosity and cultural expectations placed on women in both regions and read a poem from Cologne’s Mirrors collection, which reflects on history, inheritance, and identity.  

Before we wrapped up, Hannah shared some book recommendations,

 Render / An Apocalypse by Rebecca Gayle Howell and 

Judas Goat by Gabrielle Bates explores landscape and identity in fascinating ways. She left us with a final thought: now is a great time to make art. Writing down your experiences is vital in this challenging moment, and your unique voice is worth sharing.  

This conversation with Hannah was genuinely inspiring, and I’m so grateful she joined me to explore the beauty of language, place, and the power of poetry. Thank you for tuning in, and until next time, keep exploring the world around you through words.

Social links:

https://hannahvwarren.com/

https://www.instagram.com/hannahvwarren/

https://bsky.app/profile/hannahvwarren.bsky.social

www.inkofsingh.com

Transcript

Taran Singh:

Hey everybody, today my guest is Hannah Warren. She is a poet, translator, and a keen observer of life. She is the author of the poetry collection *Slaughterhouse of Old Wives' Tales* and two chapbooks. Hannah is a creative force, beaming with originality, surprise, and depth. Welcome, Hannah!

Hannah Warren:

Thank you so much for having me on your podcast. I’m really excited about what you’re doing here—thinking about poetic journeys and how we arrive at our contemporary space in writing. Thrilled to chat with you.

Taran Singh:

It’s an honor to have you on the show. Today, I want to explore the beauty and connective power of language. But before we dive into that, I’d love to know a little more about you. You recently moved to Irondale, Alabama. Can you walk us through your early years and how Alabama became a stop in your journey?

Hannah Warren:

Yeah, Alabama is a really unexpected part of my journey—one I never anticipated. I was born in South Mississippi, in Jones County, in a tiny town that no one has ever heard of. It had a very small population and very few opportunities to engage with things like poetry because that just wasn’t the concern of people living their day-to-day lives.  

It wasn’t until I went to college that I realized poetry wasn’t just Robert Frost or the other dead white guys we read in high school. Instead, it could be something much more miraculous for a contemporary reader and writer. The first time I really engaged deeply with poetry was in Catherine Pierce’s Introduction to Poetry course during undergrad. Catherine is an excellent poet—her most recent book is *Danger Days*, which I highly recommend.  

In that class, we read Natasha Trethewey, who has been our national poet laureate and was also the poet laureate of Mississippi. Natasha Trethewey changed the way I thought about language, writing, and what we can do with it. She was writing unabashedly about the place she was from, which includes a lot of Mississippi, Louisiana, and Georgia—places I felt didn’t often appear in poetry. I didn’t think we were allowed to write about our experiences like that. The only time I had engaged with Southern literature was through writers like William Faulkner, so this was outside my scope of experience. It was super exciting to me.  

I started learning more about poetry and myself, eventually pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in poetry and creative writing at the University of Kansas. There, I learned more about the type of writing I was interested in, which fell within grotesque poetry, with poets like Danielle Cadena Deulen, and speculative literature—exploring the weird and uncanny in writing.  

I struggled for a while, trying to figure out how to apply that to myself. I avoided writing about the South because I had finally left and didn’t want to deal with that part of who I was anymore. So, I wrote about dinosaurs, the prairie, and other things—but not the place I was from.  

Eventually, I moved back to Georgia to pursue a PhD, and that’s when I started thinking about what the South meant to my writing again. I was confronted with all the parts of myself I had avoided. What does it mean to be from South Mississippi as a poet, especially as a woman poet? A lot of my work now is deeply Southern Gothic, thinking about womanhood in the Deep South.  

I’m in Irondale, Alabama, doing a lot of that work still—engaging critically with my ecological, natural, and cultural landscapes and thinking about what those spaces mean to me. I didn’t expect to end up in Irondale, Alabama. I didn’t move here for my work; I just kind of landed here due to other personal circumstances. But it’s been really good for my writing because I’m in this landscape that feels so fraught to me.  

I’m right outside Birmingham, only three hours away from where I grew up. It’s the closest I’ve been in a long time. I’ve lived in Germany and England—as far away as physically possible—and then somehow landed right back in the place where I began. It’s been really interesting.

Taran Singh:

Irondale, Alabama—where poetry is going to be forged, right? I like how you said there’s so much in the South that people don’t often explore. It’s a part of the country I haven’t visited much, but I’m learning more about its history through my son, who’s studying American history right now.  

I know you hosted a poetry reading at your home. In the digital world we live in, a lot of events are virtual. Can you tell us how the idea for the home poetry reading came about and how it went?

Hannah Warren:

Yeah, absolutely. I started a poetry series inside my house called *Aesthetic Shock*. I’ve been thinking deeply about how landscape influences us. Since I’m in Irondale with no prior attachment to this place, I wanted to find a way to connect myself to this landscape.  

I’m working on a Master Naturalist certificate right now. Alabama is the fourth most biodiverse state in America, which no one knows because when people think of Alabama, they think of the Civil War, racism, and all the negative stereotypes of the Deep South. They don’t think about the fact that we have the most species of oak trees in America or more carnivorous plants than any other state. This place is really strange.  

So, I started thinking about how I could marry this ecological interest with poetics. I reached out to some poets I really love. One of them is local—Miriam Kaleh, a phenomenal Maltese poet who lives in Birmingham now. Zachary Anderson is in Tuscaloosa, writing about Western landscapes. And Stacy Balkun is an incredible poet from New Orleans.  

All three of these poets are writing about landscape in fascinating ways—either their current landscapes in the Deep South or the places they’re from. None of them are originally from the Deep South, but because they’ve been here for a while, the South has bled into their poetics.  

We had a great audience of local poets and literature enthusiasts come to my house to listen to these three poets have a deep conversation about what it means to write within a specific space. It was my way of connecting more to this place I’m in now.

Taran Singh:

That’s amazing. I didn’t know any of those facts about Alabama. I love how you’re merging ecology and poetry. We’ll definitely have to bring you back for another episode to talk more about your Master Naturalist journey.  

Let’s switch gears to your first book, *Slaughterhouse of Old Wives' Tales*. How did that title come about? And while you’re sharing that story, could you also read the note to the reader from the book? When I first read it, I was completely captivated. It felt like you were inviting the reader into a deeply personal space.

Hannah Warren:

Yeah, absolutely. The title came after a long time. I started this manuscript when I was living in Kansas, during that period when I was trying to avoid writing about the South, but it kept coming out. I was writing about the Natural History Museum at the University of Kansas, the prairie, and other landscapes, but I wasn’t writing about the place I was from.  

When I moved back to the South, I started integrating more of myself into the book. I realized that a lot of my writing was weaving together personal experience and natural history with old wives’ tales from the Deep South. These tales often reflect how women are supposed to keep their bodies pure or avoid associations with the devil—ideas that are deeply tied to patriarchal norms.  

The title comes from a poem in the book, but it also reflects my desire to “slaughter” these old wives’ tales—to challenge the harmful ways they’ve been passed down. Not all old wives’ tales are bad; much of our scientific knowledge comes from them. But many are rooted in patriarchal norms that don’t serve contemporary women.  

Here’s the note to the reader:  

*“I know there are ways to write poetry in which I ignore you entirely, but I have never been one for closing my eyes in the dark or sewing my lips in empty white churches. I want to part your mouth with my fingertips, to hear you whisper salt blood in my ear. I want us to say the words monstrous and safe and devil-dark together. I want you to tell me your favorite dead thing. I tattoo your name on my wrist with saliva. I balance it on my tongue like duck fat. You, you, you, you, you. I have questions, and maybe you can’t answer, but I have to ask: On what root-heavy road does your ankle twist? How does it feel to spool sand behind your teeth? What do you invent when your bulbous flesh melts deep into swamp water?”*  

This note reflects my desire to engage the reader in a conversation about the landscapes and experiences that shape us. It’s not an instruction guide but an invitation to explore the sociopolitics of womanhood in the Deep South.

Taran Singh:

That’s so powerful. I admire the courage it takes to write so honestly about these themes. Society often covers up the pain and struggles of women by labeling them as sacred or pure, but that purity often masks something darker.  

One poem that really struck me was “You hum quietly in your home.” It felt like a deep internal cleansing. How did that poem come about?

Hannah Warren:

That poem is part of a larger series called *Arranged Self*. It’s a set of interconnected poems I wrote during COVID, which was a strange time for me. I was living in Athens, Georgia, and every day I thought about how we’re socialized in our economic and social spaces. During the pandemic, we got a break from that.  

For me, it was a time of reflection on gendered spaces, especially since I wasn’t around my family, who have very traditional gender roles. I spent a lot of time hiking and noticing things I’d never paid attention to before. Georgia has a way of hiding its history—like monuments that look beautiful until you realize they’re tied to slavery or the Trail of Tears.  

The humming in the poem reflects the sound of being alone in my house, making noise without an audience. It’s about finding your voice in isolation and confronting the layers of history and identity that shape us.

Taran Singh:

That’s beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. Before we close, I want to ask about your journey into poetry. You mentioned it was almost accidental. Can you share that story with our audience?

Hannah Warren:

Absolutely. In undergrad, I was determined to be a fiction writer. I thought poetry was frivolous. But when I took an intro to poetry class with Catherine Pierce, I fell in love with it. Reading poets like Natasha Trethewey and Laura Gilpin showed me that poetry could be narrative and deeply meaningful.  

I realized I could find freedom in poetry that I couldn’t find in fiction. It was a reluctant love at first, but now I can’t imagine writing anything else.

Taran Singh:

That’s such a great story. Poetry has a way of pulling you in before you even realize it.  

Before we wrap up, can you share a bit about your latest manuscript, *Hurricane Pastoral*?  

Hannah Warren:

Sure! *Hurricane Pastoral* is my dissertation manuscript. It explores how women navigate Gothic landscapes in the Deep South and Germany. I compare the intense religiosity of the South with the Catholicism I encountered in Germany, and how both shape women’s experiences.  

Here’s a poem from it, called *Cologne’s Mirrors*:  

*“Tourists mouth-perch cameras in the nave. The points are for Gothic. It feels like an apology. I’m sorry we glimmer in this pulpit’s point. I’m sorry we paid the Lord to see pinched-to jewels and marbled dead men. I press my palm, then my tongue, to callous stone, and feel war’s grit. One stone angel on the flute, another on the extended horn. This Catholic shout, this painted leap. An old graveyard splits square inside a square. Old stone walls, spiked with quartz. New chain-link with roses woven through the diamonds. Rocks crushed from other, larger rocks—mountain to boulder to riverstone to gravel. We inherit what we need. Inside my great-grandmother was my grandmother, was my mother, was myself. And inside me is nothing.”*  

Taran Singh:

That’s stunning. Thank you for sharing that. And congratulations on finishing the manuscript!  

Before we close, do you have any book recommendations or final thoughts for our listeners?  

Hannah Warren:

Yes! I highly recommend *A Render an Apocalypse* by Rebecca Gayle Howell and *Judas Goat* by Gabrielle Bates. Both are incredible explorations of landscape and identity.  

And my final thought is this: Now is a great time to make art. We’re living in a challenging moment, and writing down your experiences is so important. Your voice is unique, and it’s worth sharing.  

Taran Singh:

Thank you so much, Hannah. This has been an incredible conversation. And thank you to our listeners for joining us. Until next time, keep exploring the beauty of language and the world around you.