Quote

The first spoken word poem I ever wrote was when I was 14 and I wrote it because I was accidentally signed up for a teen poetry slam. Because I loved poetry I said that I'd try it out.

Sarah Kay

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Sarah Kay
Age: 28 †
Born: 1971
Born: February 3
Died: 1999
Died: February 20
Author
Educator
Playwright
Writer
Brentwood
Essex
Sarah Marie Kane
Word
Teen
Ever
Slam
Firsts
Signed
First
Spoken
Trying
Poem
Wrote
Poetry
Loved
Accidentally

More quotes by Sarah Kay

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Ever since I was little, I’ve loved making hand-made cards and presents and arts & crafts for people. The book gives me a similar experience. I love being able to hold this object in my hands and say, “This is mine. I made this. It is a gift for you.” I love that feeling. Especially since this particular object contains ten years worth of my poems.
Sarah Kay
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But in Hiroshima, some people were wiped clean away, leaving only a wristwatch or a diary page. So no matter that I have inhibitions to fill all my pockets, I keep trying, hoping that one day I'll write a poem I can be proud to let sit in a museum exhibit as the only proof I existed.
Sarah Kay
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I use poetry to help me work through what I don’t understand, but I show up to each new poem with a backpack full of everywhere else that I’ve been.
Sarah Kay
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You are not made of metaphors, Not apologies, not excuses.
Sarah Kay
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I often tell people to stop being afraid of writing bad poetry, or bad anything. I think that a lot of times, when people claim that they have writer's block, or that they get stuck, it's just because they're scared of writing bad things.
Sarah Kay
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One of my highest priorities as an educator is to be as inclusive as possible.
Sarah Kay
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Spoken word teaches that if you have the ability to express yourself and the courage to present those stories and opinions, you could be rewarded with a room full of your peers or your community who will listen.
Sarah Kay
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If I should have a daughter, instead of Mom, she's going to call me Point B.
Sarah Kay
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Poetry makes people nervous. Especially in schools.
Sarah Kay
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It's really hard for me to remember all of the places that I've been but I can remember all of the delicious meals that I've ever eaten. I love traveling by way or stomach...and finding quiet time.
Sarah Kay
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I want [my daughter] to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind.
Sarah Kay
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I fell in love with poetry through storytelling, so my poetry tends to be fairly narrative. I like characters, I like having a beginning, middle, and ending, though not necessarily in that order.
Sarah Kay
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Every moment I choose to write about is one I have deemed important enough to dwell inside of and share with others. I am holding this moment up to the light and saying, Wow, will you look at that?
Sarah Kay
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Sometimes I am puzzling over something for months and months and the poem gets created in small bursts and rewritten a hundred times, and chopped up and put back together, etc. Occasionally, though rarely, a poem just plops out of my head fully-formed. But always it is a blueprint of what my brain is trying to navigate at that moment.
Sarah Kay
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Our day-to-day lives are pretty chaotic. So in terms of the writing part, you have to get pretty disciplined about finding quiet moments and making sure you're making time for the art side, on top of all the time-consuming business side.
Sarah Kay
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It does not matter how strong your gravity is, we were always meant to fly.
Sarah Kay
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I do like celebrating women, I do like celebrating different lifestyles and choices and people and it makes me happy when others find my work empowering.
Sarah Kay
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Most days it feels as if the world is whirling around me and I am standing still. In slow motion, I watch the colors blur people and faces all become a massive wash.
Sarah Kay
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My self-confidence can be measured out in teaspoons mixed into my poetry, and it still always tastes funny in my mouth.
Sarah Kay
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Poetry is like a puzzle-solving strategy for me. I like to poem my way through tricky questions and ideas. That's about the only consistent thread through my poem-creation process.
Sarah Kay