Andrea Gibson (1) (1975–2025)

Many years ago I obtained a handful of mp3s of Andrea Gibson's spoken word pieces, and they are so raw and powerful that even now, after I have heard them so many times, they are so intense that more times than not I have to skip past them if they come up on shuffle because I am just not ready for the tears.

So when I saw Lord of the Butterflies on the National Poetry Month display at my local library, I knew I had to pick it up, even if I had concerns about how painful it might be to read show more it.

While there were poems in this collection that brought me to tears, overall I found the heart of this to be one of hope and persistence. These poems pick at gender, celebrate queerness, mourn violence, and struggle with mental illness. CW in particular for gun violence.

I liked this so much I was browsing the button poetry website between poems, planning to buy my own copy to keep. show less

I will never not give Andrea Gibson’s poetry 5 stars. The amount of highlights speak for themselves, I mean come on. The way they transcend time and space and queerness is what I strive to do as a writer. I feel so seen by their poetry in ways that I even try to keep hidden from myself. It’s as though they’ve read my inner thoughts and articulated them in a way I could only ever dream of doing. Even my girlfriend, who is not a fan of reading in general, likes their work because it goes show more beyond poetry. It’s visceral and visual and very very freaking good. Even if you don’t read poetry I recommend this book, no matter what you’re going through there is a poem, or at least a line that will speak to you. show less

It wasn't until I read 'Queer Youth are Five Times More Likely to Die By Suicide' with tears in my eyes (I was a queer youth, after all) followed by 'No Such Thing as the Innocent Bystander' that I realised this poetry wasn't just magical, it was also extremely powerful. Before I hit these poems in particular, I wondered if Gibson was prone to letting their poems sometimes disintegrate towards the end in a way that made me wish they were tightened up a little more, and it took me a few poems show more to realise this is intentional, and they start off coherent and then spill into raw emotion in a way that's like a gift. (Some are extremely tight as well, don't get me wrong, this isn't an 'every poem' thing, just a 'some of them' thing).

So grateful to Button Books for the review copy, because this is a new author to me, in Western Australia, and I've needed poetry like this. I think any queer person, any nonbinary person, any gender-diverse person would, but so would any person who cares about justice, and time, and love, and heartbreak, and chronic illness. There's a lot of stand out moments here, a lot of them, from the declaration in that intent title, to the dreamlike cover, to the poems which start out as a story and end up bleeding the truth in sentence fragments and emotional raw wounds laced with so much hope.

I'm the kind of reader that automatically starts unconsciously assigning stars when I first start reading. I hovered on four stars, and then shot right past five and am now annoyed I can't actually force Goodreads to assign more, lol. Love this treasure trove, and will be rereading it going into the future. show less

I didn’t know who Andrea Gibson was when I decided to read this book. I read this collection today and I know that I will be back to it again. Some of the words will take some time to sink in. Although Andrea is known as a spoken word artist, I feel like a lot of the same spirit is captured in their writing.

If words could paint a picture, Andrea Gibson would be the person spray painting the magical mural on the old abandoned brick power plant. You know, that building people want their show more photo taken in front of because it’s like being transported somewhere that’s … not here.

Pain, change, relationships, family… everything.

How do you review a book of poetry? There are words that standout… poems that will stick with me. “Orlando” is an unflinching look at the horrendous shooting at the Pulse nightclub. It’s a vivid note to us that we are closer to having been there than we acknowledge.

“My yes never fit into the no of this world,” sums up some of the delicious poetry in this collection. This is a book for those of us who don’t fit into the standard mold.

“Ode to the panic attack” is brilliant. I want to keep it in my back pocket like a secret manifesto.

These words are a mixture of dance, politics, ethereal thoughts, gender, hearts, and all the dust-mote-thoughts in the corners of our minds. It’s beautiful and raw.

The way Gibson strings words together reminds me of all the reasons people write.

Read this.

And, if you’re curious about Gibson’s work, check out their YouTube channel. It’s pretty amazing. show less