Hello, I'm Dawnevyn River (he/they), a transmasculine poet living in a country carved from stories not of its own, where the light falls long and thoughts run deep. My work is rooted in the raw terrain of trauma, mental illness, neurodivergence, queer identity, and the quiet astonishment of simply being alive.

I began sharing my poetry on Hello Poetry in 2014, a teenager spilling truth into open space. Those early pieces, now archived, were a lifeline then. Today, I return with a steadier hand and a deeper voice - writing that reflects the growth, grief, and grace of adulthood.

These poems are both survival tools and love letters to the ordinary. I invite you to walk with me through the small, sacred moments we often overlook, and to find, together, a kind of beauty in the everyday.

I wish I could hold your hand without my palms sweating or my fingers shaking
I wish I could look you in the eye without having my insides ache with the feeling of man eating butterflies
I wish I could think about you without my head spinning
I wish I could read your sweet messages without crying because my anxiety does not deserve love, and sometimes anxiety is all I am.

When I die, dear Mother
don't give my body away
to science.

I'd rather have it given away to poetry.

I want people to cut me open
and observe
how my bones were riddled with
melancholic verses of joyful pasts.

They have to see
the scarlet of my blood was the hue
I stole from the sunsets of
wishful thoughts.

Dear Mother,
give my body away
to the art of writing:
for they have to look past
everything they have ever learned.

They must know
of how much I loved and I lost,
and how that made the twine of my ribs
a story to tell.