Poetry
FALL 2026Losing One’s Pelt
by AMANDA PASSMORE-OTT
When the last leaves cling and birch and beech become ribs fleshed among stands of hemlock, bone by bone, hair by hair she lives out there, half in half out. She lies with the antlers, yellowed by time and greening with moss buried in leaf -litter. I have seen her reflected in shallow pools rimmed with hoarfrost, head of twigs and service berries, brown eyes flecked with gold like acorns. I wonder what she sees outlined in the sky above: certainly not her brindled coyote pelt. Pale skin pinpricked with chill, thin and vulnerable, a wisp of fog. Boots become cumbersome. Socks bunch as if they want to unwind like bark held too long round the trunk. Knuckles crease with dirt and the earth-musk of Maitake mushrooms mounding in the basket. This is what women learn when they dig and remember what it meant to be four-footed.
White-plumed Honeyeaters by Michaela Farrington
Amanda Passmore-Ott
Amanda Passmore-Ott lives in the ridge and valley portion of the Appalachian Mountains and holds an MFA in Poetry from Vermont College of Fine Arts, teaches writing at Penn State University, and is a faculty affiliate at Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center where she works with the Long-Term Ecological Reflections Project. She also holds a Nature Journaling Educator’s Certificate from the Wild Wonder Foundation. Her recent chapbook, Human Wilderness, was published in 2024 by Finishing Line Press, and her poetry has appeared in such journals as Snowy Egret, The Hopper, Unbroken, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Blueline: A Literary Magazine Dedicated to the Spirit of the Adirondacks, Albatross, and Northern Appalachia Review, among others.
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