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“THERE’S NO THROUGH TRAIL” —HAN-SHAN, TRANSLATED BY GARY SNYDER
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2023 Issue on Renewal Cover
November 20, 2023

2023 Issue on Renewal

Volume 51

Editor’s Note

Loyal readers and new visitors,

This breathtaking issue, focused on a myriad of works that inhabit the delicate and nuanced ideas of renewal, has been a full year in the making. To our amazing contributors, we are grateful for your patience and unwavering support through a time that, for CMR, has been less about renewal and more about transition.

We all face change in the course of our lives. Sometimes we can be found eagerly running toward it and sometimes we are trying to narrowly escape its reach. But that we will face it is an inevitable and universal experience; a deeply vulnerable part of being alive. This has been a deeply vulnerable year for the editors at CMR, and we have endeavored to remain steadfast in the mission of this magazine while incorporating the flexibility needed to adapt to change we did not seek out.

As you can see, we have undergone a transition in both space and appearance. Our much beloved website, coldmountainreview.org, is now a shadow only available on the Wayback Machine Internet Archive to those who choose to seek its memory. We are here now, in a new space and with a new facade. But trust us in this: our content, our focus, and our heart has not changed.

Over the many years of its publication, Cold Mountain Review has gently shifted course in the focus of its content, at times more interested in one particular aspect of eco and social justice than another. But it has not wavered in its mission to create the serious mischief of cultural change. And, I would argue, in its parallel mission to respond to cultural change.

In that mission we stand fully committed.

In service of that mission we ask for your support. Stay with us, reader. Wherever our journey takes us, stay with us.

We very much want to stay with you.

Your Editors,

Katy Abrams and Mark Powell

Award Winning Poetry Collection

Liz Robbins

Eight Poems

by Liz Robbins

2023 Issue on Renewal Cover

The Sweeter Cool of Darkness

by Matthew Wimberley

Creative Nonfiction

Sean Patrick Hill

Essay

Fiction

Natasha Alexandrova

(1949) Bali Ha’i

by Natasha Alexandrova

Shayla Felix

45 Million Ghosts

by Shayla Felix

Andrew Furman

Trailblazing

by Andrew Furman

Caroline McCoy

Museum of Hard Times

by Caroline McCoy

Meredith Sue Willis

The Sweetest Man Who Ever Lived

by Meredith Sue Willis

Pamphlet

Ron Mustard

Dear Dad

by Ron Mustard

Personal Essay

Zackary Vernon

Where Is Cold Mountain?

by Zackary Vernon

Poetry

Jennifer Atkinson

Five Poems

by Jennifer Atkinson

Maddie Baxter

White Clay

by Maddie Baxter

Jennifer Dennehy

Preservation

by Jennifer Dennehy

Sarah Elkins

False Spring

by Sarah Elkins

Sarah Giragosian

Two Poems

by Sarah Giragosian

Marc Harshman

Four Poems

by Marc Harshman

Marj Hogan

Used To

by Marj Hogan

Fin Keegan

Thinking Big

by Fin Keegan

Jerry Lieblich

Doomsday Vault

by Jerry Lieblich

Kristina Percy

Ripple Rock, 1958

by Kristina Percy

Dane Ritter

Two Poems

by Dane Ritter

Ellen White Rook

Thrush Morning

by Ellen White Rook

Megan Russell

Alpenglow

by Megan Russell

Gerry Sloan

Release Point

by Gerry Sloan

Ellen Stone

Cleaning the Shed

by Ellen Stone

Rob Vance

Two Poems

by Rob Vance

Nancy Young

Earth Day

by Nancy Young

Visual Art

Anjula Caldwell

Five Works

by Anjula Caldwell

David Goodrum

Three Works

by David Goodrum

Radoslav Rochallyi

Dame

by Radoslav Rochallyi

Mark Rosalbo

The Day After

by Mark Rosalbo

Melissa Barousse Sarat

Water Guardians

by Melissa Barousse Sarat

Cold Mountain Review is published once a year in the Department of English at Appalachian State University. Support from Appalachian’s Office of Academic Affairs and College of Arts and Sciences enables CMR’s learning and publications program. The views and opinions expressed in CMR do not necessarily reflect those of university trustees, administration, faculty, students, or staff.