I’m a full-time mama & part-time poet trying to do this life as a creative.
Hola!
Hi. I’m Bree Bailey. I wrote a book!
My writing journey began the second I learned how to write cursive. The swish and swoop of the letters excited me and I began writing really realllllllly terrible poems, songs, fairy tales… the like of a precocious second-grader. I think by third or fourth grade I received first place in my class’ creative writing poetry contest and thought I was God or something. My writing journey then continued as I got older (& clearly less God and more human) and pushed myself into songwriting as comfort, but up until early 2020, I never considered myself a poet or a writer. I only wrote things I thought others wanted to hear. Things that rhymed, reverberated in my ears because it made sense. Things that were easy. Things that got stuck in your head, but didn’t live there in a way that made ya better.
…and then a global pandemic and an even more difficult pregnancy began.
And god damn was everyday a waking sense of dread, worry, hope, love, and community. I gifted myself my first writing workshop entitled Poems that Don’t Suck, taught by notable Write Bloody poet, Megan Falley, on a whim and met friends who would become family (poemily, dare I say?) and learned under some of the brightest minds and tenderest hearts.
Somewhere along my fourth or fifth fully edited poem, I realized I’ve been a writer and storyteller all of my life. All of us have. I think it’s innately human to be a storyteller and it’s one of the most gorgeous things about each of us — how personal and tender our stories become in sync with one another; how they coexist without being uttered. As we are all vessels in our community moving in sync or not - here are these chapters begging to be read or written. Soon after that workshop, I started writing to publish so that I could one day be a role model for anyone who doesn’t consider their work to be “good enough”. Or if they don’t consider themselves a writer. Or a fucking god at the story of their truth. It is. It matters. You are. You are magic. Here’s me with some finger guns saying “you are awesome!” because you actually frickin’ are. You are nor your past or your future - don’t let one word capture your juice.
So, uhh what else do you want to know about me?
Well, I love making new friends, but I also struggle with complicated PTSD, anxiety, OCD, and a few other not so obvious mental and chronic autoimmune illnesses. I never thought to share that with anyone, let alone the entire public, but here we are. Did I mention how the pandemic changed everything about me? About that.
It was through the toughest months of my life, I decided I wanted to start telling my stories about struggling with these mental health issues and the joy are everything else in-between, because that’s the real deal. I want to be vulnerable and tell you how awful I am and how amazing I am. I don’t want to hide, and I want to share in a way that feels right to me and my truths… and hopefully, resonates with you, too, but it’s okay if it doesn’t. Let’s still be friends. I’ll keep ya safe. :)
“If an angel exists, is it because I birthed her?”
— quote from my poem “In Two Minutes This Poem Calls Me Mom” in the like of Jonathan Safran Foer’s piece “Two-Minute Personality Test”