This piece is incredibly special to me; it’s about the beautiful, messy process of letting go.
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Caitlin Levy
Mentee
Caitlin is a mentee with a love for poetry, arts and crafts, and puns. She can often be found geeking out about science with her friends, writing spontaneous songs, or reading by a window. She spent last summer studying slam poetry with Urban Word, and she's soon going to return as a counselor at her book club camp. Above all, she's immensely grateful for the Girls Write Now community.
Artist‘s Statement
One of my favorite quotes is from the writer Akwaeke Emezi: “Understand this if you understand nothing: it is a powerful thing to be seen.” I write because I know there’s a possibility that someone, even if just one person, will feel seen by it.
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My Natural History
This poem is special to me; it is connected with my own journey of living with anxiety, longing, and what it means to be in my body.
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Me Here, With You
These poems speak to the intimacy of a single moment with another person.
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From Under a Tree & the August Sun
I spent a lot of summer 2020 sitting underneath trees and trying to find the words to articulate what exactly I was feeling and not really being able to find the words. There’s usually a real feeling of restlessness that accompanies summer for me and I think it was amplified by the pandemic.
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Haiku Series for Erik and Lloyd Ocean
This piece is inspired by Erik Simpanen and Lloyd Mullings, both of whom I read about in The New York Times. They were married in September 2020 and changed their last names to Ocean.
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Broken Glass/Not Yet Formed
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about being myself—and what that means for me as a young woman. I wanted to write something that reflected being free in my ability to dream and imagine any life for myself as a girl in the twenty-first century.