Nicole Cooley is the author of seven books of poetry including the forthcoming Mother Water Ash (Louisiana State University Press, 2024), as well as Of Marriage (Alice James Books, 2018) and Girl after Girl after Girl (Louisiana State University Press, 2017). She is also the author of a collaborative artists’ book (with book artist Maureen Cummins), Salem Lessons (Maureen Cummins, 2010), and a novel, Judy Garland, Ginger Love (Harper Collins, 1998). Her work has appeared most recently in Tupelo Quarterly, Scoundrel Time, and Poetry. Her awards include The Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets, a Discovery/The Nation Award, a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, a Creative Artists fellowship from The American Antiquarian Society, and the Emily Dickinson Award from the Poetry Society of America. She is the director of the MFA program in creative writing and literary translation at Queens College, City University of New York.  

Photo by Alex Hinton