Tessera

Conyer Clayton

@conyerclayton.bsky.social

Writer, Poet, and Editor from Louisville, KY in Canada | the lake-shaped excuse, Oct 2026 @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social | 2025 MacDowell Fellow | conyerclayton.com | they/them

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Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 3h ago

I love Mikko Harvey's writing; this praise means a lot to me!! It is about 2 months until the release of my 3rd book, the lake-shaped excuse @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social! Pre-orders are immensely helpful for a book's success (links below), and US/Canada tour details coming soon! xo 🌅💛

“the lake-shaped excuse is brilliant and painful. Conyer Clayton takes us deep into grief’s interior, where a mother’s absence becomes a vital presence, carried not only in memory but in voice and body—'my head is her head and / her aura mine.’ Tender yet unflinching, these poems grapple with illness, addiction, violence, and regret. Yet they return, again and again, to the daily practice of loving—through acts of imagination, friendship, nature, and sobriety—because ultimately ‘connection / is the window / of wanting I want / to look through / the lake I want // to stand in.’”

—Mikko Harvey, author of Let the World Have You

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 2mo ago

The lake-shaped excuse, my third collection of poetry, is out Oct 6 2026. Pre-order available now! A conversation between mother and daughter beyond death; an elegy, a prayer, a regret “Brilliant and painful” —Mikko Harvey bookstore.wolsakandwynn.ca/products/the... @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social

The cover of the lake-shaped excuse by Conyer Clayton with the text “Oct 6 2026" and "Available for pre-order”

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 3w ago

"My little sister asks me" from my forthcoming third poetry collection, the lake-shaped excuse (Buckrider Books, @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social), after @sannawani.bsky.social's "Lately I Am Trying." 💛 Pre-order now 🌅 Check out Wolsak and Wynn's full fall 2026 catalogue here: tinyurl.com/423tf48z

My little sister asks me

after Sanna Wani

if I remember when I realized I could die and I don’t, but I wish I did. Did I even think as a child? Do I even think now? So much of my world develops like a photograph, in the dark room way back and is fully formed before I realize it has been there floating in chemicals I assembly-line walk by. If I think in words, I don’t know them. If I knew I could die, I was okay with it. I tell my sister I feel like I have no memory sometimes – I spit shine my own eyes so they’ll see something. The snow I forgot was falling. The ice I walked on weeks too early. If I realized I could die, I don’t remember it. It’s not my death that worries me. It’s yours. If my lake isn’t solid, maybe yours is. Yours is. Yours is. No one else can die because the ice is just a photograph I took in high school. I made you sit on a pool noodle in the middle of the street while I crouched to get an artsy angle. Your skirt was striped and black and white. I think I need to go home.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 4w ago

How lucky am I to have this incredible blurb from @cassidymcfadzean.bsky.social 🌼 the lake-shaped excuse comes out with @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social in Oct! Pre-orders are available now in the US and Canada xo bookstore.wolsakandwynn.ca/products/the...

$In striking lines that repeat and mirror in fractals, these poems tease out memory like a prayer, capturing the pain and claustrophobia of sudden loss: “My mother’s name is mine and buried in my throat.” From the book’s meditative opening, Clayton beautifully voices an embodied experience of grief and its visceral pleading: “I already / have every memory of / you I ever will.” What a gift to encounter a book that recognizes how the death of a mother gnaws from within—and to be guided so tenderly through its testimony of love. —Cassidy McFadzean, author of Crying Dress$

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last mo.

Want a signed / personalized copy of my forthcoming book, the lake-shaped excuse (@wolsakandwynn.bsky.social)? You can order it from the best indie bookstore in the universe, Perfect Books and they will ship to you anywhere in the US or Canada. 💛 shop.perfectbooks.ca/item/aemMz2r...

Text: "the lake-shaped excuse, Oct 6 2026. Pre-order a personalized copy from Perfect Books in Ottawa, ON and they will ship it direct to you after release day! 'Clayton is a poetic force to be reckoned with.' —Gap Riot Press". There is a photo of Conyer Clayton and the cover of the lake-shaped excuse.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last mo.

Today I am sharing this blurb for my forthcoming book from the generous and beautiful Chelsea Harlan. Please read her book Bright Shade! the lake-shaped excuse (@wolsakandwynn.bsky.social) is now available for pre-order in the US and Canada from your indie bookseller! Coming out Oct 6 2026. xo

Praise for the lake-shaped excuse by Conyer Clayton.

The hauntingly beautiful poems in Conyer Clayton’s the lake-shaped excuse are appropriately ripple-like in their transmutational, incantatory quality. Echoes of the speaker’s mother’s voice resound and are made new through the speaker’s own voice, resulting in a kind of blood harmony utterly unique to genetic passage. The mother and the speaker are not the same person, but in many ways, of course they are, such is “the terrible unity of wanting.” These poems want against absence, they reach for what is no longer there... but still they reach anyway. This body of work, like a body of water, refuses stagnation — this is a project born of an ever-expanding love that gives life to grief and asks, “What if / (another expanding tear) / But how,” in the same paradoxical breath. There is real music behind these quiet devotions, and we’re warmly, generously invited to listen closely. May we all learn to practice patience and grace in the face of grief, connection in the face of loss. May we trust in what lies beyond ourselves. “Pray. Then / start again.

—Chelsea Harlan, author of Bright Shade

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Lil' PSA bc as I anticipated, the description of my book using the words "mother" and "daughter" may make some cis folks confused; I am still not a woman. Still agender, still think of myself as my mother's daughter, still not a woman. Coolio!

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 4mo ago

So true.

A stone statue of a woman's head in the centre snowy yard. The snow is melting to reveal the head.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Yes tis I, The Canadian Poet 🥸

rob mclennan@robmclennan.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Canadian Poets Series #24 : Conyer Clayton / @conyerclayton.bsky.social @wolsakandwynn.bsky.social ; peripetyandortronies.blogspot.com/2026/04/cana...

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Got fresh blood (iron infusion) and a fresh website 🌼 Officially ready for spring! Thanks Mira Dahn for the fantastic web design!! conyerclayton.com

Home: Writer, Poet, and Editor Conyer Clayton

Conyer Clayton is an award-winning queer writer and editor from Louisville, Kentucky living in Ottawa, Canada. Their work often explores grief, disability, and gender-based violence through a surreali...

conyerclayton.com

rob mclennan @robmclennan.bsky.social · 5mo ago

newly posted at @periodicities.bsky.social : Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social : 2026 VERSeFest interviews: Gwen Aube / @littlepuss.net / reading this month as part of VERSeFest 2026! / @versefest-ottawa.bsky.social ; periodicityjournal.blogspot.com/2026/03/cony...

Conyer Clayton : 2026 VERSeFest interviews: Gwen Aube

Gwen Aube is the author of Missed Connections with Tall Girls (LittlePuss Press, 2026). She is a 2026 Al Purdy A-Frame Artist-In-Residence...

periodicityjournal.blogspot.com

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 7mo ago

Yesterday at work, I thought I had a rock in my boot. I went into the bathroom to take my boot off and remove the rock. It was, in fact, a small ball of mozzarella.

This Magazine @thismagazine.bsky.social · 9mo ago

When @conyerclayton.bsky.social stopped drinking, they went in search of a new, sober community for connection and support. But it's not easy to find the right fit—and they're still looking. this.org/2023/12/14/a...

A sober thought

The last time I drank I was surrounded by family. I’d just returned from a solo trip to Scotland where I drank heavily every day for several weeks. When I got home I put my foot down. Okay, only on sp...

this.org

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Aurora last night over Ottawa. First time seeing them 🤩 Visible with the naked eye too! Truly incredible.

Green and red streaked auroras in the sky above a red oak tree.

Red aurora in the sky above a residential street.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Sharing this essay on my blog about my relationship to technology and grief on the eve of the 15th anniversary of my mom's death. My mommy was the best mommy in the whole wide world. conyers-newsletter.beehiiv.com/p/on-missed-...

On Missed Calls, Technology, and 15 Years of Grieving My Mother

conyers-newsletter.beehiiv.com

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 9mo ago

On Missed Calls, Technology, and 15 Years of Grieving My Mother

conyers-newsletter.beehiiv.com

Augur Society | Augur Issue 8.3 is NOW LIVE !@augursociety.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Augur Issue 8.2 is NOW LIVE! 🎊 & you can find 2 FREE pieces on our site! Discover... 🔥 an elemental aftermath of an affair 🦖 a monstrous hymn of awe and destruction 🍯 devastation dripped in honey and rain & so much more! 🔗 Starting reading here: augursociety.org/augur-issue-... 🧵

An illustration of a field on a sunny day and here’s a clothing line with yellow and red sheets flowing in the wind, and behind them are two people, one with purple wings touching hands. with a blue overlay. At the top of the image reads: “Read it Now” in a yellow banner and underneath reads: “Augur Issue 8.2.” Bellow is the link to the website: http://www.augursociety.org. In the middle of the image is a book with the cover art of Issue 8.1. There are 6 arrows around the book pointing to blurbs from some of the pieces that read: elemental aftermath of an affair, toxic love festers through shed skin & wet sheets, young love, rusted metal, & shattered sunlight, monstrous hymn of awe & destruction, old age drama between two languages, and devastation dripped in honey and rain .

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Would you like to read a story about divorce and also a bear? 🐻🎨 ex-puritan.ca/the-painting... (Thanks @sannawani.bsky.social for including my surrealist flash fiction in the Animalia issue of The Ex-Puritan!)

A promo poster for The Ex-Puritan, with a black and white image of a black bear climbing a tree in the background, and text that reads, "This is where something both begins and ends." Conyer Clayton, "The Painting and the Bear."

Meg Pillow @megpillow.bsky.social · last yr.

Gonna say something liberals really won’t like and it’s that you’re going to have to find it in your heart to feel compassion for and attempt to help ppl in crisis whose politics you may not agree with or else you’re gonna become the very thing you claim to hate

Augur Society | Augur Issue 8.3 is NOW LIVE !@augursociety.bsky.social · last yr.

HUGE NEWS: Augur has the honour of being a nominee in THREE categories for the 2025 Aurora Awards! 🎊 📌 FYI... -Voting is NOW OPEN to all CSFFA members & membership is just $10! -Deadline to vote: July 19th @ 11:59 EDT. 🔗 Link to sign up & vote: www.csffa.ca Scroll down to see what's nommed! ⬇️

Kerry C. Byrne @kercoby.bsky.social · last yr.

Putting on my Publisher hat, I have an announcement: Augur Press will be open to submissions of Novellas & Novelettes from both agented and unagented writers starting THIS WEEK! It’s not open yet. But while we wait… AMA about publishing with this fledgling small press.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last yr.

I often avoid nonfiction "grief books" because for me they can be too prescriptive and didactic—attempt to be too broad and sweeping. But this book avoids these things, and it really moved me. Highly recommend. “‘How will he know you loved him,’ she asks, ‘unless you try to destroy yourself.’”

A hand holding up Grief is for People by Sloane Crosley. The edge of a deck and woods and blue sky are visible in the background.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last yr.

My first suit; it is green, and I am obsessed.

Conyer taking a mirror selfie wearing a light green suit and a black t-shirt.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last yr.

Me doing structural edits on my novel rn. (The Librarian by Guiseppe Arcimboldo)

The Librarian by Guiseppe Arcimboldo, a painting of a man made of various books and papers.

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last yr.

ME ❤️/🍪 BOOKS, indeed.

Conyer taking a mirror selfie in a shirt that says "ME HEART BOOKS" with Cookie Monster's face underneath. The heart is made of a cookie.

Sanna Wani @sannawani.bsky.social · last yr.

PLEASE SHARE! I am raising funds for a dear friend and member of the literary as well as arts communities. $5 and $10 goes a long way! Reshares even further! We are just $800 from our goal and my hope is bluesky can take us the rest of the way. 💛💛💛 chuffed.org/project/1299...

Riverboatjack @riverboatjack.bsky.social · last yr.

new gender neutral greeting just dropped

Terese Mason Pierre @teresempierre.bsky.social · last yr.

Poetry friends and poetry lovers! ✨️ I have two "Myth" launches next week with some super cool writers! 🌴🧜🏾‍♀️👽🌙🌺 May 6 at Perfect Books in Ottawa May 8 at Pulp Books in Montreal I'd love to see you there! 😘

Conyer Clayton @conyerclayton.bsky.social · last yr.

I have always been really put off by celebrity, even the notion of "genius". As a writer and also a bookseller and events coordinator specifically, working in often quite large events and literary festivals, I have become even more put off by the cult of celebrity around writers in particular.