Tea&Books

“The trauma said, ‘Don’t write these poems.
Nobody wants to hear you cry about the grief inside your bones.”
― Andrea Gibson, The Madness Vase

“He showed me his scars, and in return he let me pretend that I had none.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe

“My mouth is a fire escape.
The words coming out
don't care that they are naked.
There is something burning in here.

When it burns I hold my own shell to my ear,
listen for the parade from when I was seven,

when the man who played the bagpipes
wore a skirt.
He was from Scotland.
I wanted to move there.

Wanted my spine to be the spine
of an unpublished book,
my faith the first and last page.

The day my ribcage became monkey bars
for a girl hanging on my every word
they said, "You are not allowed to love her."
Tried to take me by the throat
to teach me, "You are not a boy."

I had to unlearn their prison speak,
refusing to make wishes on the star
on the sheriff's chest.

I started taking to the stars in the sky instead.
I said, "Tell me about the big bang."
The stars said, "It hurts to become.”
― Andrea Gibson, The Madness Vase

“Picasso said he'd paint with his own wet tongue
on the dusty floor of a jail cell if he had to.

We have to create.
It is the only thing louder than destruction.
It's the only chance the bard are gonna break,
our hands full of color
reaching towards the sky,
a brush stroke in the dark.

It is not too late.
That starry night
is not yet dry.”
― Andrea Gibson, The Madness Vase