7 Instagram Poets Worth Following in 2022
Put some poetry in your Instagram feed
There’s no doubt about it: social media sites like Twitter and Instagram have changed the way we read poetry–and also, apparently, how we write it. Black ink on white paper? No good. Aspiring poets use typewritten cards, photography, and unorthodox formatting to make their poems stand out and get clicked on.
In a sense, it should come as no surprise that poetry is thriving on these platforms: Twitter’s 140 (now 280) character limit leaves just enough room for a poem, or perhaps flash fiction; and Instagram’s focus on visual aesthetics means an artistically formatted poem with an accompanying photo can capture the attention of a young reader in a way that literary magazines do not.
On one hand we now have a democratization of poetry so anyone can publish their work without fear of rejection; on the other hand–well, there is a lot of really bad poetry getting out there. (The original title of this article was “20 Instagram Poets Worth Following in 2022”. Five hours of research later the number became “10”. And finally, after much exasperation: “7”.)
And yet, the research paid off. After scrolling through an endless feed of tacky one-liners about heartbreak superimposed over moonlit nightscapes or supermodels, I managed to rake up a few gems. Here are seven poets who are actually worth following on Instagram in 2022.
Brian Bilston (@brian_bilston)
Affectionately dubbed the unofficial “Poet Laureate of Twitter”, Brian Bilston has garnered the fandom of some 85,000+ Twitter followers as well as over 60,000 on Instagram–and for good reason. His poetry is topical, accessible, witty, and often hilarious; a quick scroll through his Instagram feed will reveal an abundance of humorous poems about anything from falling leaves to looking for stamps, with an occasional poem poking at politics to great effect.
Unlike the vast majority of Instagram’s poets, most of Bilston’s posts simply feature words printed against a white background–there’s no fancy photography lurking behind the text to distract the reader (although he does get creative with form now and then). In this regard, Bilston may appeal more to readers of “traditional” poetry.
Bilston’s work is a fresh reminder that poems needn’t focus solely on broken-heartedness or be hopelessly oblique. Sometimes they can just be fun. Brian Bilston writes fun poems.
Brian Bilston’s latest book is the poetry collection Alexa, What is There to Know About Love?
Kate K. (@sorsaiwrites)
With a modest 271 Instagram followers, Kate K. is currently flying under the radar of Instagram’s algorithm, perhaps because she posts rather infrequently (six times in the past nine months). Many of her poems are concerned with the same tropes the most popular Insta-poets became famous for: heartbreak, self-love, social justice, etc. (Kate K. is very focused on the political turmoil in Hong Kong based on her profile’s Linktree as well as poems such as this.
What separates Kate K. from the typical Insta-poet however is her willingness to experiment in style. It’s refreshing to read a heartbreak-inspired poem that breaks free of the cliched norm and offers something deeper. Hopefully next year will bring us more of Kate K’s work. Fingers crossed.
Tim Key (@timkeypoet)
Grab a slice of Richard Brautigan, sprinkle it with some Donald Barthelme at his weirdest (lightly, gently), rip it all to shreds and toss it skyward. Watch as the confetti drifts to the floor. Now pick up a piece. It might look something like this.
Tim Key’s poetry could be classified as a sort of absurdist flash fiction. The poems often contain characters, have some sort of rising action, and pay off the reader with a good laugh. He uses Instagram’s focus on eye-catching images that pop to great advantage: not only are the poems themselves funny and entertaining–they’re also creatively displayed using a fat arsenal of techniques: overlaid on playing cards, pinned onto boards, and photographed while still in the typewriter for example. Some may find a visual element to a poem off-putting, but in Tim Key’s case–it really works.
The truth is, although Tim Key is technically a poet, readers of flash fiction will likely enjoy his work as well, given Key’s penchant for prose poems.
Aside from his poetry collections, Tim Key has also published “Poetical Playing Cards” which are–surprise, surprise–a full deck of poker-sized playing cards replete with Key’s poetry.
Kate Baer (@katejbaer)
Kate Baer is the 2x New York Times bestselling author of the poetry collections I Hope This Finds You Well and What Kind of Woman. Her Instagram page also sports an impressive 150,000+ followers. Needless to say, there are undoubtedly scores of readers who are already familiar with her work.
Speaking of which: Baer’s poetry, which hones its lens on themes of womanhood (double-standards between men and women, motherhood, self-love) also has an ingenious “found poetry” element to it: since the publication of her first book, Baer has been inundated with all manner of trolling, hate mail, and spam. And what does she do with it? Answer: chop it up and use the lines to craft her own poetry, such as this.
Kate Baer’s Instagram profile is worth the follow not only because she publishes a good poem now and then, but she also posts the asinine messages she receives from random haters that have ultimately coalesced into her second poetry collection, I Hope This Finds You Well.
Kristiana Reed (@kristiana.reed)
Kristiana Reed is a writer and freelance editor who is the editor-in-chief of Free Verse Revolution, a literary magazine. It should come as no surprise that she is also a burgeoning poet who publishes on Instagram a few times a week.
Her poems, unlike many of her contemporaries’, can’t be pigeon-holed into one topic. One day she’ll post a poem about a conversation in line at the pharmacy, then the next could be about soap-mohawks in the bath. In a time when it seems 99 percent of Instagram poetry is nothing more than self-help clichés with line breaks, reading a poem that tackles the same issues without seeming quite so maudlin is like breathing a pocket of fresh air in a peat bog.
Kristiana Reed’s poetry collections include Flowers on the Wall and Between the Trees.
Austin Kleon (@austinkleon)
Another writer who perhaps needs no introduction: Austin Kleon is the New York Times bestselling author of Steal Like an Artist among several others. He writes a weekly newsletter on Substack that boasts over 90,000 subscribers and his Instagram account is followed by nearly 145,000 people at the time of this writing.
According to his website, Austin Kleon “is a writer that draws”. And draw he does–chiefly in notebooks and “zines” (booklets made from a sheet of paper)–although he is also quite a prolific collage artist, discoverer of “found” poems, and creator of blackout poetry as well. Naturally, his artistic merit serves him well on a platform like Instagram–and with well over 7,000 posts so far, it doesn’t look like he’s slowing down anytime soon.
Hollie McNish (@holliepoetry)
Last but certainly not least on the list is Hollie McNish. McNish is a UK-based poet whose work can be characterized as honest, in-your-face funny, transgressive–and yet somehow not bawdy. (At least not bawdy for the sake of bawdiness.)
In other words, when you read a Hollie McNish poem: you know it. Take this one, about recreational Viagra use; a lesser poet may have used the subject matter to conjure yet another victim-narrative about the predatory nature of oversexed boys. McNish is more nuanced in her approach and demonstrates an ability to perceive the issue from the male point of view as well.
And then there’s this one, all cuddles and coziness and warm fuzziness: “and here, with us too, all bundle / of blankets, salads to soup, / dip thick bread and butter”.
If you like poets who can write well about more than one thing, check out Hollie McNish’s Instagram page and be blown away. Her most recent book of poems, Slug: and other things I’ve been told to hate will be published in February 2022.
