Terrance Hayes was one of the first poets I read. It was for an African-American Lit class in college, we read Wind in a Box, and I remember reading and re-reading those poems, discovering that poetry is not just the old school, dense stuff, the stuff that might be talking to me, but probably only by accident. Poetry is also this poet, talking directly to me. It caught me by surprise—this closeness. It made it almost impossible to not hear him, even after the book was done.

I was perusing a bookstore when I came across Pansy by Andrea Gibson. I’d just gone to an open mic in a bookstore that had been, in part, an ode to Gibson—how many people they touched with their work, how relatable and accessible the work felt. The host, before the mic began, said something like you don’t realize, when somebody passes, how much you’ll regret not getting new work from them. I’m going to miss their blog.