This woman
Is a woman who
Frequently turns words
Into sunshine
Turns phrases into moonshine
That gets you drunk.
It either geeks you out
Or tears you up
And either way
You find yourself stuck
To your seat,
The room spinning,
Your mouth grinning
Your tears leaking, streaking down your face
Without your permission.
Her words are just bliss and
You find yourself
Aching for more.
This poet will leave your heart sore
Like legs after running.
Or she’ll make your soul soar
Like a baby bird becoming something
That can finally reach the clouds.
The woman speaks nothing
But the truth and she’ll
Speak thoughts from your head
That you never knew you had.
She will leave you breathless, yet breathing.
She will leave you reeling
She will leave you feeling
Like nothing on this earth
Is worth less than a thousand words.
When you and I might see black and white
This woman’s mind will take flight
And make rainbows
Out of letters and lack of punctuation.
Her words have given her a reputation.
She holds up a sign that says
These feelings are mine,
But I hope you can use them.
And if she says it, you can sure as hell see it.
She talks about
Play ground bullies and love,
She talks about growing up
And rising above
The storms that blow so many of us away.
She talks about being young.
And being gay
While living among
A homophobic family
Who struggles to see her way
Of life as acceptable.
A four time Denver Grand Slam champion
Not to mention the credit for touching a million
Young people who struggle to smuggle
Themselves into normality.
But she says to hell with normality,
And teaches what she has already learned
And preaches what she has discerned to be
Good advice.
She tells us to simply be nice.
And kind
Through the words that rhyme
Easily
Peasily.
Abandoning the dictionary
But somehow you always know
What she means.
Like in your dreams
When you see a face
Which you don’t recognize,
But somehow you know who it is
Despite their vague looks
Her words have left the corners of her note books
And found home in the corners of our minds
In many corners of the world.
And here it finally unfurls.
This woman:
The poetry charmer
The phrase farmer
A woman with words for armor...
Andrea Gibson.
