I can’t tell you how thrilled and moved I was to find out that The Garbage Poems had won the Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Poetry 😭😭😭

Sadly, I couldn’t be in New York City to attend the ceremony in person, but I’m grateful to Namitha for reading a few words out loud for me.

If you are hearing this, you probably know before I do that The Garbage Poems has won a Lammy. I am most likely out at the Eramosa river swimming with my friend Lisa, and trying to feel the magic of this room from afar, where so many beautiful and grieving and joyful world-building voices have gathered in one place to celebrate each other.

In this time of ongoing rising fascism, of genocide in Palestine and beyond, of proliferating anti-trans legislation and militarized AI, I am grateful for the writing that helps me keep my heart open in the midst of grief and injustice, and that reminds me that art is part of the work of re-making the world, not only for queer and trans liberation but for the liberation of all people everywhere.

This book is partly about the way joy can be a tool of survival, can threaten the status quo of existing power structures. It means so much to me to be recognized by this particular award, and to be part of the lineage that meant so much to me as a young queer writer. Thank you to everyone who made this book possible, especially to illustrator and collaborator April White, my brilliant editor Alayna Munce, and everyone at Brick Books who helped bring this book into the world with joy and care.

To paraphrase a line from the book: Amid whatever nightmares of the waking world, may you have a door in your brain marked: Here be joy.

See the Lambda Literary website for a full list of finalists and winners.