NIKKI UMMEL is a queer artist, editor, and edu­ca­tor in New Orleans. Nikki has been pub­lished or has work forth­com­ing in Gulf Coast, The Georgia Review, Black Lawrence Press’ In the Tem­pered Dark, and others. She is the 2022 recip­i­ent of the Leslie McGrath Poetry Prize. Nikki is the co-founder of LMNL, an arts orga­ni­za­tion focused on read­ings, work­shops, and res­i­den­cies. She has two poetry chap­books, Hush (Belle Point Press, 2022) and Bayou Sonata (NOLA DNA, 2023), funded by the New Orleans’ Jazz and Her­itage Foun­da­tion. You can find her on the web at nikkiummel.com.

This poem orig­i­nal­ly appeared in Stonecoast Review Issue 22. 

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