Lola Rainey is a Southwestern based poet and storyteller. She started writing poetry roughly six years ago, and it has become her favorite form of creative expression due to the fact that her life in the desert "lends itself to introspection and quiet reflection". She considers herself a multi-cultural poet because she grew up in the racially and culturally diverse borderlands of Southern Arizona. Her travels to places like Southeast Asia and North Africa expanded her concept of family and altered her notions about "belonging"; "experiences that helped this daughter of the African Diaspora feel more rooted in the world". In 2015, she completed Callaloo Journal's Writer's Workshop held at Brown University. From Lola: "The experience was transformative. It forced me to rethink everything I thought I knew about poetry. I am grateful for the shattering of the old because I like the new poet emerging from those broken bits."