“This book offers exactly the kinds of old women’s voices our world needs to hear: strong, sexy, and loving. Wilderness Sarchild is a beacon of passion and wisdom.  These compelling, honest poems will change lives.” —ANNIE FINCH – Poet, Performer, Ritualist, Teacher

“In OLD WOMEN TALKING, Wilderness Sarchild confronts the specter of aging that terrifies so many of us head on.  She wrestles honestly with wrinkles, fear of dementia, the loss of friends and loved ones, and demands of herself that she say yes to aging and yes to the fact of her own eventual death.  This is a necessary collection and strong medicine for all of us.”–MARGE PIERCY – Novelist, Poet, Memoirist

“There’s no way to write about poetry without being honest. If I’m dishonest, I’m not writing about poetry. I’m writing about something else. The truth about Wilderness Sarchild’s Old Women Talking is this: I feel less lonely when I read it. It’s emotional without being sentimental, so I can feel it without squirming in my seat. It’s all kinds of things at once: part lament, part joy, part fear, part death-is-not-an-ending or, if it is, that’s okay. She writes about things that are important and universal, though some people who are afraid to look a thing full in the face will turn the other way. As for me, I’m not a big fan of rhyming chants, except the few that anchor this collection — the Hags and Crones pieces – which are plain echoes and frank portents that connect me to women, and more women, and still more women who know about earth and sky, water and wind, fire and why we’re here, how we ripen toward death, where we’ll go when we’re ready to move on. I don’t need to like this poetry. It doesn’t need me to like it. But I do, since there’s  something knowing and ancient about it. Something I knew in the womb. Something I’ll know on my last day. That’s there’s no beginning. No ending. Just what we are in the dark, without excuses or apologies, authentically human. And something else, besides.”–LAUREN WOLK–Poet, artist, author of Those Who Favor Fire, Wolf Hollow, Beyond the Bright Sea

“In Old Woman Talking, Wilderness Sarchild binds the wounds of our broken world. Through story, and in bold, intimate detail, she honors the full arc of a woman’s life. Nothing escapes her discerning heart: not wrinkles, not abuse, not racism, not death, not joy.  A volume for all women, and the men who love them.”–SUSAN CERULEAN– author of award-winning Coming to Pass: Florida’s Coastal Islands in a Gulf of Change, and Tracking Desire