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A review by kareimer
You Better Be Lightning by Andrea Gibson
5.0
This book is tremendous. Andrea Gibson has such a talent with words. It is shocking reading their work sometimes. It’s kind of jolting the way they are to craft words together. Like I have access to these same words, but I sure can’t write like that. Also, there is such variety in their poems.
This first one is about white privilege being weaponized by white queers to ignore our racism.
Andrea Gibson - A Letter To White Queers, A Letter To Myself. ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpBUenMIe8U
"our country is still lynching, is still calling the hung bodies shade. When our country is right now rolling a red carpet from the blood that pours and people are dying. dying for us to notice our footsteps are red. Our silence is not a plastic gun. It is fully loaded. It has lethal aim. It is 1998 and James Byrd Jr. is not yet dead."
The second is on queer youth and suicide. It’s heartbreaking and important. But somehow, impossibly, it ends hopefully. I highly recommend watching their live reading of it.
[https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/andrea-gibson-queer-youth-are-five-times-more-likely-to-die-by-suicide-video/](https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/andrea-gibson-queer-youth-are-five-times-more-likely-to-die-by-suicide-video/)
The other live poem of theirs that I would highly recommend is
“queer youth, are five times more likely to die by suicide
means you were five times more inclined
to triple padlock your diary,
means you were five times more likely
to stop writing your story down,
means, I write my heart out now.
I’ve graffitied billboards with the page of my diary,
the bullies start the rumors with….
"I
like most of my queer friends don’t have a child,
I have millions from Nebraska to Chechnya
to the Baptist church where I grew up,my pride in them is a parade
I know won’t keep all of them alive
but I keep cutting my diary into confetti
to throw at their hopes when they float by scared”
They also write about sexual assault. I love that there is a celebration of their strength. However, the violence, the disgrace, and disappointment are put back on the abuser.
“No man’s spirit escapes the hell he denies putting a child through, which is to say, I am the only one out of the two of us who survived you, and I survived you so beautifully. Even on my worst days, my scars are the backroads/ where kids sneak out their windows/ and drive through the night/ to hear poetry. I am so much/ of who I dreamed I’d be when I grew up, and what does the boy you once were think of the man you became?”
There are short lines that are gripping and impactful.
“What if we don’t have to be healed/ to be whole? There are holes in every inch/ of the fabric that makes me who I am.”
Some of the poems are less sad, and more just empowering.
“I read that people scream when they are in pain because screaming/ actually lessens the pain- / anyone who asks you to hold your tongue/ is asking you to hold the heaviest thing/ in the galaxy. Forget them and remember you/ can tell me anything about how hard it is/ to stop flirting with your experation date.”
Overall tremendous book. Thank you Andrea for your gift.
This first one is about white privilege being weaponized by white queers to ignore our racism.
Andrea Gibson - A Letter To White Queers, A Letter To Myself. ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpBUenMIe8U
"our country is still lynching, is still calling the hung bodies shade. When our country is right now rolling a red carpet from the blood that pours and people are dying. dying for us to notice our footsteps are red. Our silence is not a plastic gun. It is fully loaded. It has lethal aim. It is 1998 and James Byrd Jr. is not yet dead."
The second is on queer youth and suicide. It’s heartbreaking and important. But somehow, impossibly, it ends hopefully. I highly recommend watching their live reading of it.
[https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/andrea-gibson-queer-youth-are-five-times-more-likely-to-die-by-suicide-video/](https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/andrea-gibson-queer-youth-are-five-times-more-likely-to-die-by-suicide-video/)
The other live poem of theirs that I would highly recommend is
“queer youth, are five times more likely to die by suicide
means you were five times more inclined
to triple padlock your diary,
means you were five times more likely
to stop writing your story down,
means, I write my heart out now.
I’ve graffitied billboards with the page of my diary,
the bullies start the rumors with….
"I
like most of my queer friends don’t have a child,
I have millions from Nebraska to Chechnya
to the Baptist church where I grew up,my pride in them is a parade
I know won’t keep all of them alive
but I keep cutting my diary into confetti
to throw at their hopes when they float by scared”
They also write about sexual assault. I love that there is a celebration of their strength. However, the violence, the disgrace, and disappointment are put back on the abuser.
“No man’s spirit escapes the hell he denies putting a child through, which is to say, I am the only one out of the two of us who survived you, and I survived you so beautifully. Even on my worst days, my scars are the backroads/ where kids sneak out their windows/ and drive through the night/ to hear poetry. I am so much/ of who I dreamed I’d be when I grew up, and what does the boy you once were think of the man you became?”
There are short lines that are gripping and impactful.
“What if we don’t have to be healed/ to be whole? There are holes in every inch/ of the fabric that makes me who I am.”
Some of the poems are less sad, and more just empowering.
“I read that people scream when they are in pain because screaming/ actually lessens the pain- / anyone who asks you to hold your tongue/ is asking you to hold the heaviest thing/ in the galaxy. Forget them and remember you/ can tell me anything about how hard it is/ to stop flirting with your experation date.”
Overall tremendous book. Thank you Andrea for your gift.