Leslie Contreras Schwartz is the fourth Houston Poet Laureate. She is the author of three collections of poetry: black dove / paloma negra (FlowerSong Press, 2020), Fuego (St. Julian Press, 2016), and  Nightbloom & Cenote (SJP, 2018), a semi-finalist for the 2017 Tupelo Press Dorset Prize, judged by Ilya Kaminsky. She currently teaches at The Alma College Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, a new low-residency graduate program in Alma, Michigan.

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 (University of Arizona, 2022), 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.

Contreras Schwartz was born in Houston, Texas, with Mexican American and Mexican roots going back several generations in Houston and Texas. She is a graduate of The Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and earned a bachelor’s at Rice University. Contreras Schwartz is also a member of the Macondo Writers’ Collective. She has taught at University of Houston and Rice University, teaches community workshops, and is a speaker on the topics of mental health and poetry. 

Learn more at www.lesliecschwartz.com.