Mary Ellen Lough is a writer, wildcrafter, homesteader, and poetry therapist and is the owner of Appalachian Sacred Smoke, locally grown and wildcrafted herb bundles for everyday ritual use and sacred ceremonies. She first connected with Haden by soaking up the secondhand smoke of a friend whose life was being transformed by the program, and later through poetic and creative work with Sheila Petruccelli. She has taught poetry and creative writing to veterans with PTSD and hosts the Farmhouse Poetry Series at her beloved old house, offering eclectic circles in poetry, dreamwork, depth psychology and earth practices. She has trained with and written for The Institute for Poetic Medicine, was awarded recognition as a 2016 Resilient Woman Leader of the Year by Asheville Resilient Women’s Foundation and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize in Poetry. Her work has been performed at the MATA Festival in NYC, and her poems have been published by Zymbol magazine, Americans for the Arts, Asheville Arts in Medicine, Chapel Hill Press, The Porch Magazine, and selected as a runner up for the Orison Prize in Poetry.
