Andrea Gibson, the poet and performance artist whose four-year fight with ovarian cancer was chronicled in director Ryan White’s 2025 Sundance Film Festival documentary Come See Me in the Good Light, died Monday, July 14, at their home in Boulder, Colorado. They were 49.
Gibson’s death was announced by their wife, Megan Falley, who also is featured in the documentary that won the Sundance Festival Favorite Award and airs this fall on Apple TV+, and their friend, Stef Willen. “Andrea Gibson died in their home (in Boulder, Colorado) surrounded by their wife, Meg, four ex-girlfriends, their mother and father, dozens of friends, and their three beloved dogs,” the Instagram post states.
Gibson’s poetry and spoken word performances often dealt with LGBTQ+ topics, gender norms and social justice. The poet self-identified as genderqueer and used they/them pronouns.
Born August 13, 1975, in Maine, Gibson moved to Colorado in the late 1990s and was named the state’s poet laureate for the last two years. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis paid tribute to Gibson on Monday, saying they were “truly one of a kind” and had “a unique ability to connect with the vast and diverse poetry lovers of Colorado.”
Others paying tribute included comedian Tig Notaro, who is an executive producer on Come See Me in the Good Light and a longtime friend of the poet. “The final past few days of Andrea’s life were so painful to witness, but simultaneously one of the most beautiful experiences of all of our lives,” Notaro wrote on Instagram. “Surrounded by real human connection unfolding in the most unlikely ways during one of the most devastating losses has given me a gift that I will never be able to put into meaningful words.”
“Rest in power beautiful human,” Ariana DeBose wrote in an Instagram Story.
Among Gibson’s books are You Better Be Lightning, Take Me With You and Lord of the Butterflies. In addition to LGBTQ+ and gender issues, the poet’s work also addressed their illness and mortality. In one poem, Gibson wrote, “Will the afterlife be harder if I remember/the people I love, or forget them? Either way, please let me remember.”
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