Originally from Auburn, Alabama, Marianne Kunkel is the author of Hillary, Made Up (Stephen F. Austin State University Press) and The Laughing Game (Finishing Line Press), as well as poems that have appeared in The Threepenny Review, The Missouri Review, The Notre Dame Review, Rattle, and elsewhere. Kunkel is an Associate Professor of English at Johnson County Community College in the Kansas City, Missouri, area. While earning a Ph.D. at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Kunkel was managing editor of Prairie Schooner and the African Poetry Book Fund. Kunkel is Co-editor-in-chief of Kansas City Review and winner of Frontier Poetry’s 2024 OPEN Prize. Kunkel’s poem “Apostate Abecedarian” will appear in The Best American Poetry anthology coming out in September.