Queer Poem-a-Day is a program from the Adult Services Department at the Library and may include adult language.
Cremello Horse
by Keetje Kuipers
I do not want to make your strangeness exciting.
It’s too short a distance from wonder to terror,
and blue eyes in a horse is something wondrous.
Like you, I’ve been found strange. Like you,
I’ve glowed in a field at night and had nowhere
to hide: my high laugh, that birthmark, so many
things others could see but that I’ve had to twist
myself to examine. Once, in a circle of rapt faces,
a boy pushed my girl-body against a wall
with such force his touch could not have been far
from wonder. You’ve known it, too, horse—
the sugar cubes and wick of razor wire. See
how that feels? he said, as if I’d pushed him first.
And perhaps something in me had.
Copyright © 2023 by Keetje Kuipers. This poem first appeared in the magazine 32 Poems and was then published her book Lonely Women Make Good Lovers (BOA Editions, 2025).
About the Author
Keetje Kuipers’ fourth collection of poetry, Lonely Women Make Good Lovers, was the recipient of the Isabella Gardner Award. Her poetry and prose have appeared in American Poetry Review, New York Times Magazine, and Poetry, and have been honored by publication in the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. Keetje has been a Stegner Fellow, NEA Literature Fellow in Creative Writing, and the Margery Davis Boyden Wilderness Writing Resident. She lives with her wife and children in Montana, where she is Editor of Poetry Northwest.
Queer Poem a Day
Queer Poem-a-Day is founded and co-directed by poet and professor Lisa Hiton and Dylan Zavagno, Adult Services Coordinator at the Library and host of the Deerfield Public Library Podcast. Music for this fifth year of our series is “L’Ange Verrier” from Le Rossignol Éperdu by Reynaldo Hahn, performed by pianist Daniel Baer. Queer Poem-a-Day is supported by generous donations from the Friends of the Deerfield Public Library and the Deerfield Fine Arts Commission.
