Poet Sarah Kay‘s first book No Matter The Wreckage is a collection of poems. This collection explores family, first loves and growing up.

Kay uses everyday language to touch on universal themes that speak to readers who don’t typically favor poetry.

A great example of the universal themes employed in her book is prevalent in a poem titled “Postcards”: “you can only fit so many words in a postcard/Only so many in a phone call/Only so many into space, before you forget/that words are sometimes used for things/other than filling emptiness.” Here, Kay writes about the importance of words and how sometimes they are insufficient in curing heartbreak.

In a poem entitled “Evaporate,” Kay addresses how time speeds up when growing up. Her lines, “I notice minutes/move, much more than when I was younger” are symbolic of watching her younger self disappear.

In the poem “My Parents on Their Way Home from A Wedding,” Kay touches upon the realization that parents are separate from their children; they are two separate people in love. She says, “They are laughing through/the speaker phone, they are laughing, and they/are driving on a highway they have not been on before.”

As commonly seen throughout her poems, Kay uses everyday moments and objects as symbols for love and life.

“No Matter the Wreckage” was published by Write Bloody Publishing, and includes Kay’s poem “B” which was originally published in 2011 by Seth Godin and the Domino Project.

Kay’s poetry is entertaining and easy to read. She makes the reader feel like they are reliving their own childhood, teenage and adolescent experiences. Her poetry affirms the roller-coaster emotions of  growing up.

As a spoken word poet, many of her performances can be viewed on YouTube and on the Ted Talks channel. To find out more about Kay, visit her website at KaySarahsera.com