The Lambda Ampersand Award for LGBTQIA+ Writing is provided in partnership by Lambda Literary and the National English Honor Society (NEHS). The award recognizes outstanding creative writing by NEHS student members representing or celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community. We’d like to congratulate Daniela Navarro, author of “And You, Blue” on their 3rd place honors for the 2025 award.
AND YOU, BLUE
by Daniella Navarro, Mexico
They said blue was cold.
That it clung to silence,
that it stained the mouths of those who dared speak too loud,
too real.
But you—
you were never cold.
You were fire wrapped in water,
a storm hiding in the calm.
I saw you first in the mirror,
in the crooked reflection of a body I tried to abandon,
in the shadows of my voice
when I called myself by names that didn’t fit.
You whispered beneath my ribs,
a color blooming where they told me nothing should grow.
I feared you.
I buried you beneath shirts too tight,
smiles too polite,
prayers that begged me to be different.
But still, you stayed.
You were the undercurrent in my silence,
the ache behind my eyes when I said, “I’m fine.”
You were the breath I held for years,
the truth pressed into corners,
folded like letters I never sent.
They tried to bleach you out of me—
with rules, with slurs, with shame dressed up as love.
But you were already in my bloodstream.
And one day,
I let you speak.
I said my name.
Not the one they gave me,
but the one you grew inside me like a seed cracking pavement.
And I was still afraid—
but I was also whole.
Now I wear you on my chest,
not as armor,
but as skin.
You are not cold.
You are not wrong.
You are not a sin to silence.
You are the reason I stayed.
You are my becoming.
And I will never unname you again.
To learn more about the Ampersand Awards, visit: nehs.us/awards-grants/student-opportunities/lambda-lgbt-award/
