iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 21/06/2026

Happy Father’s Day to the best in the game, @grandcards.bsky.social

The Corner

when they tore down
Tiger Stadium, my husband said nothing is sacred

but that was before he had children

before he discovered how beautifully the soft head of a new life
tucks into the corner
of his elbow

from April and Back Again, by me

Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 20/04/2026

41 today. Woohoo. If you’d like to help me celebrate, consider getting a copy of my book, or if you’ve read it and liked it, recommend it to a friend, or request a copy through your library. Or just go out and be kind today and try to enjoy your Monday. www.publishinggenius.com/catalog/apri...

midlife by Claire Taylor

I wish I could go back
hold that girl in my arms
& tell her

sing your off-key songs

the world is deaf
to the pleasures of women

no one's listening anyway

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 28/03/2026

This post about my kick-ass bestie broke containment. Imagine if 10% of the people who liked this post bought a copy of the book. Hell imagine if 5% did. This is poetry, all numbers are big numbers. from @pubgen.bsky.social or wherever you buy books www.publishinggenius.com/catalog/apri...

Screenshot of a post with way more engagement than it deserves

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 27/03/2026

This sucks, Vic. I’m sorry. Please imagine that I am one of these kittens hugging you, who is also a kitten. What’s was your dog’s most ridiculous or hilarious trait/behavior?

Two adorable gray and white cats snuggling together on that back of a couch.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 07/03/2026

Last day of AWP and I’ll be at the book fair for a bit with @pubgen.bsky.social signing copies of April and Back Again. Come see me at booth 961 around noon if you want one or just want to say hi.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 26/02/2026

you love to see it Kinda digging how different this face looks when you view it upside down

A box full of copies of April and Back Again

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 22/02/2026

Kick off AWP by primal screaming with me, @vicnogaywrites.bsky.social @josephlezza.com & Annie Powell Stone Bring a sad, angry, grieving poem to share in the open mic. Wednesday, March 4 at 8pm, Upstairs at The Point in Fells.

AWP offsite Event flyer, text:
Write the Pain Away: An Evening of Rage and Lamentation

March 4 at 8pm at The Point in Fells

Reading and open mic

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 14/02/2026

A Love Poem for your Valentines Day from April and Back Again which comes out in 10 days from @pubgen.bsky.social! www.publishinggenius.com/catalog/apri...

A Love Poem

I wanted to write you a love poem
but I woke up and the ground
was still covered in ice, the sky
still a sullen gray
Not again, I thought
I can’t bear another day of this
but then there you were
pouring the coffee
scrambling the eggs
looking so much like
the promise of spring

by Claire Taylor

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 02/02/2026

Can't wait to see some tulips. Got to step in an actual puddle today since sunshine and temps hovering around 32 degrees finally have a bit of this ice melting. (Originally published in One Art)

Poem, text reads:

yes, it’s probably because of climate change, but still

I like a garden of tulips
sprung too soon
speckled with ice in February
hoping

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 23/01/2026

Don‘t let the cover art & abundance of sad poems fool you, I’m actually a mostly happy person and I’m ecstatic to receive this proof copy of my book! You can order a copy here (ships in February): www.publishinggenius.com/catalog/apri...

Photo of a happy me holding up a copy of my book April and Back Again. The cover art depicts an unhappy me.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/01/2026

only getting better and better

Photo of my outstretched legs with one kitten snuggled up sleeping against me and another lounging in the background

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 11/12/2025

My book has a cover!!! & it rocks! Shout-out to Liz Woodward for her amazing artwork. April and Back Again is coming your way early next year from @pubgen.bsky.social. I can't wait to share this collection 💛💛💛💛

Cover of April and Back Again by Claire Taylor featuring a color pencil and pastel image of a woman's face.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/11/2025

Politics is a constantly repeating cycle of frustration & disappointment. Hang in there. Go read a book. Find something beautiful. Take care of your community. (from “The Morning After Trump is Reelected, I Think About Time Travel” in my debut collection, April & Back Again, coming Feb ‘26)

Photo of scattered autumn leaves on a path. Picture includes text from the poem "The Morning After Trump is Reelected, I Think About Time Travel.”

Autumn leaves break
from their branches and blanket
the ground. We crunch their brittle
veins beneath our feet.

The year slowly edges toward
an ending. Time doubles back on itself
again and again.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 24/10/2025

Truly can’t get over this Halloween candy I picked up today. Hard to believe this bag was only $3.99.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 21/10/2025

My debut poetry collection, April and Back Again, is coming Feb 24th, 2026, from @pubgen.bsky.social! You can get a peek at the vibes by reading "October (After My Hysterectomy)" in the Fall issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social. www.whaleroadreview.com/taylor-5/

Photo of two pumpkins in a pumpkin patch on a beautiful fall day. Picture includes text from the poem "October (After My Hysterectomy)"

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 11/10/2025

The world may be hot garbage but my dahlias are tremendous.

My hand holding a bunch of beautiful dahlias

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 25/09/2025

Very excited to receive a Best of the Net nomination for my poem about dinosaurs & existential dread. Huge thanks to the editors of DMQ Review for being such fans and champions of this piece!

WHILE MY SON RATTLES ON ABOUT DINOSAURS I
CONTEMPLATE THE FUTILITY OF LIFE

I understand why the Evangelicals are skeptical. These strange feathered beasts. Fanged monsters. Sharp-clawed short-armed freaks. The plesiosaur is technically a marine reptile. The brontosaurus doesn't actually exist. Or maybe it does again? So much has changed in the brief history of my living. So much has stayed the same. Pterosaurs are not dinosaurs at all, my son informs me. The things I thought I knew have been lost to time. I tell him we once owned a
machine that rewound VHS tapes; it worked at twice the speed of the VCR. He can't fathom a reason for this device which is how I feel about AR-15s and every vitamin for sale on Instagram. Could a gun kill a dinosaur, he wonders and I try not to picture him shot dead while learning math. I have no idea. Probably yes. Definitely not. I understand so little about evolution and extinction. One thing changing, something else dying away. He asks me how life begins and I speak vaguely of sperm and ovum, some notion of love but he's talking about the
world-how did it get here, when will it end. I haven't the energy for science or poetry. To explain how the stars are our kin. Imagine a day when dinosaurs return, our bones drifting in sea-rise graves. They'll talk of God and mysteries. Dust clouds. Intolerable heat. How we mowed each other down. We go back and forth about which dinosaurs are our favorites and I settle on the triceratops because it's one of the few I can remember. He picks one I've never heard of before and I nod along, say that's a good one, though I've already forgotten its name

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 19/09/2025

"No one wants to be cored to their pit." This whole book is a beauty. Homing: Poems, by Emily Decker from @yellowarrowpub.bsky.social #smallpressseptember

Peeling Away by Emily Decker

PEELING AWAY
I've been leaning against my counter longer than I'd planned.
It always happens this way, when I see the mounds
heaped at the Saturday market and remember
how good the peaches were last summer.
The best peaches I've ever had are always last summer's.
I buy too many, then wind up here, peeling away
and re-looking up hacks like ice baths that never work.
What makes the difference anyway between a peach
that peels easily and one that doesn't?
The ripeness, sure. But could it be its resistance
to being skinned and handed to a toddler,
or preserved in a blue mason jar,
Or stuck in a freezer for the aspirational smoothie?

No one wants to be cored to their pit.
Still, I resent the slivers of fuzzy skin
that cling to more flesh than I want to give.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 12/09/2025

This whole book is brilliant. The Woman’s Part by Jo Gatford from @stanchion.bsky.social. #smallpressseptember

Photo of the book The Woman’s Part by Jo Gatford

Highlighted text from The Woman’s Part by Jo Gatford.

“The problem with wars is there are too many sons in them. Too many mothers left waiting, praying those other mothers are the ones left weeping.”

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/09/2025

This book is fantastic! I'm not much of a film buff even & I still loved this. So sharp, well crafted, absolutely fascinating. I want to shove it into everyone's hands & shout "Read this! Read this!" So yeah, read this. @autofocusbooks.bsky.social @ferrifrigida.bsky.social #smallpressseptember

Photo of book Out There in the Dark by Katharine Coldiron

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 01/09/2025

The other day on this same extensive wooded trail in the middle of the city, my toddler and I heard someone playing bagpipes through the trees and went in search of the source. Truly delightful.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 21/08/2025

Really enjoyed this collection by @aaronburch.bsky.social from @autofocusbooks.bsky.social The thinking about how you’re going to tell the story while you’re still in the middle of living the story is deeply relatable.

Photo of the book A Kind of In-Between by Aaron Burch

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 17/07/2025

Trees, clouds, a happy dog, and three days of focused writing to finish the first draft of this damn novel. Let’s do this.

Photo of my dog happily rolling around in the grass.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 14/07/2025

Home Run Derby tonight. All-Star game tomorrow. Time to remind yourself that you don't actually hate the people you love, it's just too damn hot to put up with their crap. This poem (1st published in @moistpoetryjournal.bsky.social) is part of my upcoming collection from @pubgen.bsky.social.

After the All-Star Break

tomatoes
straight off the vine
sun-ripe and wet as
a lover's July skin

the day runs its
humid tongue up
my thigh

we are only sweat
and angles—exposed
elbows, bare knees, sharp

anger that hangs
heavy in the still
night air

I read once that on
hotter days
a pitcher is more likely
to hit a batter

remind me in October to apologize
for how I always
pitch it inside

aiming straight for your heart

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 03/07/2025

This is such a beautiful print journal! Thanks so much to the editors of @shopoetryjournal.bsky.social for including my poem in this issue alongside so many talented poets and incredible pieces. This piece is included in my collection that will be published next year by @pubgen.bsky.social.

Shō Poetry Journal number 7 held up in front of a wall of ivy.

Poem Text:

While playing two hours of Chutes and Ladders I contemplate the futility of life
CLAIRE TAYLOR

We can’t win. One of us reaches the top and then rolls a three and there’s that fucking chute again, the long one that takes you all the way back down to the bottom, like starting the whole game over. Roll move fall. Roll move fall. I lay awake all night not finishing this poem in my head. I lay awake all night imagining my own death. Rumor had it a boy who lived down the road from me drowned in front of his friends. He dove head-first into the river and never came up. They stood and waited, watched as the water’s surface smoothed into a tomb. At the time I asked my mother what it would feel like to drown but she didn’t know—like falling asleep, perhaps. Now I am the mother and I don’t
have any answers either. Roll move fall. Roll move fall. I am back at the bottom of the board. All it takes is a little luck to find a different ending. A new series of numbers. Four instead of three and suddenly it’s over. I picture a body bloated with silt. A mother choking on grief. I lay awake all night counting my breaths.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 27/03/2025

It’s Opening Day & I desperately need a break from the news so let’s do a thread of baseball pieces! Here’s one of mine originally published in @underreviewlit.bsky.social

HOME RUN
CLAIRE TAYLOR
After Miguel Cabrera hits his 499th home run I make you guess all the members of the 500 club
You take it so seriously
Give it more thought than the time
You took the job that moved us halfway across the country
Without talking to me first
But I forgive you; it's a nice life Sitting here, watching you rattle off the first twenty Like it's common knowledge, lips pursed To draw out five more, brows knit to conjure The final two. I stare
At the small fold of skin Above the bridge of your nose, the lift
In your lip
You can do this all day
I can do this forever: watch you
Like an easy pitch right down the middle
Hungry for contact

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 11/03/2025

This poem was originally published in @paddlerpress.bsky.social back in 2022 but since I went ahead and had another kid since then, it still applies today.

While My Child Naps I Read a Book in the Sun
Claire Taylor and it feels like a rebirth
the soul of me sprung from my body like a seedling pushing through earth what good is survival, I ask on the shortest days
the darkest nights the answer a faraway echo of birdsong, the robin waking
to greet the morning light

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 28/02/2025

Starting some research for a novel idea that’s been kicking around in my head for the last three years.

Picture of book Women in Baseball: The Forgotten Story by Gai Ingham Berlage

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 06/02/2025

An old poem (originally published in Doghouse Press) but one that is bringing me a bit of comfort as my household fights through a nasty cold while also watching the world crumble.

A poem:

CLAIRE TAYLOR
Tracks

he stomps his boots to make footprints runs his trucks- dumper, loader, bulldozer, roller
tracks through the fresh snow
I follow them
out of my darkness, back
to where the morning light shines
on his smiling face

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 21/01/2025

In today's newsletter, as I head into a new round of parenting a toddler, I'm sharing a little advice on how best to manage these tricky toddler years. otherthoughts.beehiiv.com/p/much-two-m...

There is no silver bullet.

For the times when your toddler goes full werewolf, you’ll find the internet is loaded with advice and scripts for how to limit tantrums and halt meltdowns. Any of these methods will work some of the time. None of them will work all of the time.

But if you’re looking to add to your arsenal of techniques, here’s a helpful script you can try that acknowledges the difficult position your toddler is in while providing a clear directive and opportunity for independence:

“You’re very upset. It is so hard being part hellbeast sent to this earthly realm to test my fortitude for the coming apocalypse, but it is time to put on your shoes and socks so that we can go outside. Would you like to wear the blue socks or the red socks?”*

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 12/12/2024

Who's got holiday poems? I want to read them. Here's one of mine that was initially published a few years back in Second Chance Lit.

My Father And I Take The Same Antidepressant

Christmas is canceled.
He's finally making good on that threat-
lifting the tree by the trunk with one hand and
splashing water out of the stand
onto the floor. Later my mother will mop it up
with towels and a knowing shake of her head.
The limbs are still strung with rainbow lights and covered in
ornaments: reflective red orbs, popsicle stick reindeer, handmade
paper cutouts framing our smiling school portraits,
a bizarre wooden clown that years from now
we'll finally throw out
having collectively decided it looks vaguely racist.
He flings open the door and heaves the tree into the backyard.
Ornaments smash and scatter across the grass.
Christmas is canceled, he tells us,
quietly closing the door.

Years from then I tell him
"Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" is unequivocally
the best Christmas song ever.
Oh definitely, he agrees. But only
the old version. The one about
muddling through somehow.
Yes, obviously. Of course
the muddling through.
Yes, obviously
we've always had that in common.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 05/12/2024

Guess my weirdo toddler’s favorite song.

Screenshot of Spotify wrapped top song, Timber by Pitbull, Kesha which I was forced to listen to over and over this year.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 03/12/2024

Here's the poem if you'd like to give it a read.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 23/11/2024

This is the one I have had the most people reach out to me about. Originally published in @literarymama.bsky.social.

Parenting Advice
By Claire Taylor

I would tell my daughter
do not file down your edges don't
go soft like the curves of your hips
over time become the razor blade
instead of the one
so easily sliced

but I had a son
better to be the wound
than the bullet I tell him
and show him where to place his hand
to stop the bleeding

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 17/11/2024

My son decided he would handle decorating the cake for my husband’s 40th. Totally nailed it.

Birthday cake with the number 40 made out of Kit Kat bars

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/10/2024

Wrote a bit about my surgery & how saying farewell to my uterus has coincided with letting go of some of my ambitions & the stress of striving. It's complicated & confusing, but I'm feeling less pressure from a variety of sources & that's a good thing. otherthoughts.beehiiv.com/p/goodbye-gr...

I haven’t fully processed this experience yet. Life is full of before-and-after moments, and many people experience a topsy-turvy blend of relief and sadness when they decide they are done having children or age out of the reproductive portion of their lives; I am not unique in this. But when that shift happens in such a dramatic fashion, to know down to the hour and be given a descriptive summary of when you went from someone who could have a baby to someone who no longer possesses the necessary equipment to do so, it hits a bit different. And when you have to physically heal from that decision, have to look in the mirror to inspect the incisions that have turned your belly into a jack-o-lantern just in time for spooky season…

Well, it’s going to take me a little time to work through everything I’m feeling.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 28/08/2024

My latest newsletter is about my adorable cat and my sadness since his death early last week. If you're interested, you can read the whole thing here: otherthoughts.beehiiv.com/p/maggs

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 07/08/2024

My latest newsletter is about depression and pain and the ways I've succeeded and failed in talking to my kids about these experiences. You can read it here if you're interested: otherthoughts.beehiiv.com/p/fine

“I’m fine,” I’ve said so many times with tears in my eyes.

Over the years, I have been perhaps too honest with my son about my depression and my pain, and the way the two interact. And yet, he doesn’t know the half of it. He doesn’t know how dark my thoughts can get. He doesn’t know that sometimes when he desperately needs to be held, the weight of his body in my lap makes my pelvis feel like it is on fire, makes my insides feel like they might explode. I don’t know what is the right amount to tell your children about your pain, both the physical and psychic kinds. I only know that I am not as good an actor as I would like to be. That when I am asked a question, my tired mind can rarely move fast enough to come up with a decent lie so I just go with the truth, or whatever version of the truth I think my son will understand.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 15/07/2024

Next up, a little road trip poem that was first published in the now-defunct perhappened mag, but that can still be found in my chapbook, Mother Nature, which you can get here: mixam.com/print-on-dem...

A Beautiful Journey
I am willing to contort myself
prop up on all fours, drape
across the fever heat of his body
like a tray table--time for lunch
drop my nipple straight into his
wild hungry mouth. But he doesn't want me
that way. Everything on his own terms
how dare I take our private show
on the road
there's no space to
pull over, release, feed, breathe
milk and tears pulsing forward
while traffic stands still
We've seen this stretch of highway
countless times
just months ago
back home for the baby shower
tiny pointless shoes
soft blankets, stuffed bears
cardboard books with handwritten notes
Congratulations on beginning life's most beautiful journey!
Enjoy the ride!
We can make this trip with our eyes closed
I have never felt
so lost

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 09/07/2024

Gonna use this space to share some older work because why not. First up, a sad summer poem originally published in @stanchion.bsky.social back in 2021.

Photo of page from Stanchion Zine's fifth issue showing the poem, "I Used to Know a Boy With Freckles Like a Starry Sky."

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 10/01/2024

1st session of my #writing workshop about parenting, pregnancy & the postpartum experience is this Friday! We’ll be exploring nature and animal imagery in poetry and nonfiction prose. This virtual workshop is $25, or $60 for all 3 sessions. Join me! www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sig...

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 05/12/2023

My family moved when was in 7th grade & it was horrible as the new girl. Right away rumors were spread that I ate garbage & other truly bizarre stuff. It is such a difficult age & I imagine social media etc complicates the social part even more. I’m sorry you’re having to watch your kid struggle. 💛

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 20/11/2023

My workshop, The Written Womb, is open for registration! You can sign up for individual sessions or all 3 for a discount. We’ll be exploring #writing about pregnancy, the postpartum period & parenting. Come write with me starting in January! www.yellowarrowpublishing.com/workshop-sig...

Flyer for The Written Womb writing workshop featuring an image of a pregnant woman sitting on a couch with a computer in her lap.

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 01/11/2023

Thanks to The Toy for featuring my #kidlit #poem in it’s lovely Nature issue among so many fabulous writers and illustrators. 🌻

Photo of the magazine The Toy with a sunflower against a green background on the cover

Photo of magazine page featuring the following poem:

Finally, Some Rain!
grass: brown and brittle garden dirt: cracked and dry willow's lanky limbs:
so thirsty they could cry
fruit trees: wilt before they ripen flower petals: drooping low forest stream once swift and deep:
now a shallow, lazy flow
sky: hears nature's desperate plea and longs to heal its pain
a drop, a splash and then it pours:
finally, some rain!
By Claire Taylor

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 24/10/2023

My boys are super cute together lately.

I don’t write poems for the second baby

because I am too busy
living, watching him
watch
his older brother
This is the poem:
the way these boys
fell in love as strangers
and shimmer together
like two stars cutting
the same path, burning brighter
as they reflect
each other’s light

-C. Taylor

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 17/10/2023

The baby: Blah blah la bah My brain:

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 16/10/2023

The baby is trying to crawl and I am trying to write a novel and we are both feeling a bit frustrated with ourselves.

Watching the Baby Learn to Crawl, I Think About Writing

He knows he needs
to lift up
hands and knees planted
head bobbing forward
but these pieces come
one at a time

the connections are not all there yet
he is still formulating
thinking

There is a point in the distance
(a red ball) he wants
to reach, but when he lunges for it
he only sends himself backward
pushing away, the distance growing
alongside his frustration

It’s so hard, I tell him
It’s so hard
but you’ll get there

-C. Taylor

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