Anne
Kaier
In memoirs, essays, and poems, I write about the body. How does a woman with a disability see herself as a sexual being? I tangle with how my skin disorder, ichthyosis, has influenced my romantic life.
Honors include a mention in Best American Essays and the Propel Poetry Award (2025). NPR interviewed me about my essays that appeared in The New York Times. My memoir-in-progress is set at the University of Oxford, where I got an MA.

Photo: Suzanne Sennhenn

Just Published!
I'm proud to announce publication of my new book of poems. It won the Propel Series Award.
How Can I Say It Was Not Enough?
By Anne Kaier
A candid memoir-in-poems about family dynamics, love, and sex—in ravishing and accessible verse.
“Brutal yet gorgeous.”
—Poet Elaine Terranova,
author of Rinse.
“There is searing truth in these enthralling poems.”
— Eleanor Wilner,
2025 Chancellor of the Academy
of American Poets
Now Available at:
Amazon, Bookshop.org, Syracuse University Press, or your local indie bookstore.

Finalist for the AWP's Prize for Creative Nonfiction.
I'm mighty pleased and honored that my manuscript, They Said I Couldn't Have a Love Life: A Memoir, is one of ten finalists for the 2024 Association of Writers & Writing Programs' Sue William Silverman Prize for Creative Nonfiction.
Read an excerpt from They Said I Couldn't Have a Love Life at the button below.

Photo: Lisa Braxton
Craft interviews:
I talk about how my work as a poet influences my writing of memoir.
Click here to read an interview in the AWP Writer's Chronicle. I talked about disability and poetry with poets Stephen A. Kussisto, Ona Gritz and Daniel Simpson.
