Leslie Contreras Schwartz

Leslie is the fourth Houston Poet Laureate. She is the author of three collections of poetry: “black dove / paloma negra,” “Fuego,” and “Nightbloom & Cenote,” and a semi-finalist for the 2017 Tupelo Press Dorset Prize, judged by Ilya Kaminsky. Her work, including essays and short stories, has appeared in Pleiades, The Missouri Review, [PANK], Iowa Review, Verse Daily, Catapult and “Xicanx: 21 Mexican American Writers of the 21st Century,” edited by ire’ne lara silva, among others. She has collaborated or been commissioned for poetic projects with the City of Houston, the Houston Grand Opera and The Moody Center of the Arts at Rice University.