Amy M. Alvarez is the author of the poetry collection Makeshift Altar (2024) and the co-editor of Essential Voices: A COVID-19 Anthology (2023). Selected for 2022’s Best New Poets, her poetry has appeared in Ploughshares, The Missouri Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Poetry Foundation, Colorado Review, and elsewhere. She has been awarded fellowships from CantoMundo, VONA, Macondo, VCCA, and the Furious Flower Poetry Center. In 2022, she was inducted as an Affrilachian Poet. Amy was born in New York City to Jamaican and Puerto Rican parents. She currently lives and teaches in West Virginia.