In a poem Gibson wrote shortly before they died, titled “Love Letter from the Afterlife,” they wrote: “Dying is the opposite of leaving. When I left my body, I did not go away. That portal of light was not a portal to elsewhere, but a portal to here. I am more here than I ever was before.”
Linda Williams Stay was “awestruck” when her son, Aiden, took her to hear Gibson perform at a bar in San Francisco a decade ago. Their poetry was electrifying, lighting up the room with laughter, tears and love. Gibson’s poetry became a shared interest for the mother and son, and eventually helped Stay better understand her son when he came out as transgender.
“My son this morning, when he called, we just sobbed together,” Stay said. “He says, ‘Mom, Andrea saved my life.’”
“I know,” she responded.
Gibson’s poetry later helped Stay cope with a cancer diagnosis of her own, which brought her son back home to St. George, Utah, to help take care of her. They were delighted when Gibson accepted their invitation to perform at an event celebrating the LGBTQ+ community in southern Utah.
“It was truly life-changing for our community down there, and even for our allies,” Stay said. “I hope that they got a glimpse of the magnitude of their impact for queer kids in small communities that they gave so much hope to.”
Gibson was born in Maine and moved to Colorado in the late 1990s, where they had served the past two years as the state’s poet laureate. Their books included “You Better Be Lightning,” “Take Me With You” and “Lord of the Butterflies.”