Henry Langhorne, former Poet Laureate of Northwest Florida (1999-2009) is the author of nine collections of poetry: Tombigbee (1999), Listen to the River (2001), Winter Clothes (2003), The Clarity of Last Things (2005), As Fate Would Have It (2007), In the Country of Rain (2009), The Lay of the Land (2011), The Canebrake Collection (2013), and In Search of Solitude (2015).
For over twenty years, his poems have been published in a number of local and regional periodicals, including: The Sewanee Review, Hurricane Review, The Panhandler, Emerald Coast Review, Negative Capability, Poem, The Cape Rock, The Chattahoochee Review, Plainsongs, Passager, Inlet, Mediphors, Life on the Line (anthology), Dockside, On Wings of Spirit (anthology), The Pharos, and the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). He is currently a member of the Academy of American Poets.
His boyhood home was in Uniontown, Alabama, a small town in a stretch of rich, black earth known as the Black Belt, a part of the Canebrake from which The Canebrake Collection got its title. This fertile cotton land was near the Tombigbee River where tall stands of canebrake once grew.
Henry Langhorne graduated from The University of the South at Sewanee, Tennessee, and attended Tulane Medical School. His post graduate training was obtained at Charity Hospital in New Orleans. He retired in December of 2014 as the senior member of Cardiology Consultants, after practicing cardiology in Pensacola, Florida, since 1963.
BOOKS
The Search of Solitude In his latest volume of poetry, In Search of Solitude, Henry Langhorne once again offers his readers what they have grown to expect. Under intriguing titles such as “Life Is Such a Small Place,” “Her Preserves,” and “The Sixty-Year-Old Kiss,” he provides one lyrical line after another that provokes thought; elicits emotions of love, fear, regret, and thanksgiving; and offers more than an occasional surprise for the heart and mind. Known for his “doctor poems” and for his melancholy perspective on life’s events, Henry Langhorne continues both themes in this new book, sometimes in the same poem. An example is the last stanza of “4 West at the End of the Hall,” a poem about a doctor who spends a few last minutes with a patient: It all took place on 4 West at the end of the hall. I would sit, holding a hand slowly cooling. That was all.
The Clarity of Last Things:
In The Clarity of Last Things, Henry Langhorne's fourth volume of poetry, he treats his readers to an amazing tableau of poetry. Not only does he offer his fans a sampling of their favorite poems from his first three volumes. he also honors, in verse, his family and his patients, as well as the power of nature as it tore across the Gulf Coast during the years 2004 and 2005.
The Canebrake Collection:
Selected and New Poems is the eighth volume of poetry from Henry Langhorne, former Poet Laureate of Northwest Florida (1999-2009).
Tombigbee:
The poet strives to say that poetry sustains our lives, and our freedom, through the imagination. This is a book about childhood in a small Southern town and the influence of a river on the rest of his life
IN the Country of Rain:
With intriguing titles such as “Shedding Time,” “Atrial Fibrillation,” and “Twilight Golf With My Father,” Henry Langhorne once again offers his readers what they have grown to expect: one lyrical line after another that provokes thought; elicits emotions of love, fear, regret, and thanksgiving; and offers more than an occasional surprise for the heart and mind. Known for his “doctor poems” and for his melancholy perspective on life’s events, Henry Langhorne continues to offer plenty of both in this new book, sometimes in the same poem.
The Lay of the Land:
Henry Langhorne's seventh volume of poetry is dedicated to "Gus," his best friend and the brother he never had. Several of the poems are about Gus, but the cardiologist/poet also speaks to childhood, family, his patients, and the natural world in ways that will thrill your heart and prime your tears.
Henry Langhorne’s fifth volume of poetry shares not only the hard truths of life—for example, our possessions being destroyed by storm and our being born alone— but also its capricious nature—the constant changes in the clouds and in our lives. As always, the poet points with insight into every aspect of life: youth, aging, nature, illness, love, hope, death—even fishing and baseball.Light Is Life:
Henry Langhorne's tenth volume of poetry, provides everything his fans expect. Reviewer Daniel Anderson says it best: "Henry Langhorne is a poet who writes us into a quiet darkness, but never takes his eye off the balancing light of affection and gratitude that make our lives bearable and filled with meaning."
Four West:
The latest book of poetry by Henry Langhorne, includes many new poems, but it will become known for its collection of "doctor poems." Among his readers' favorites, these poems reflect the care he has given to his cardiology patients in and out of 4 West, the cardiology unit where he practiced over a lifetime.