Flyleaf Second Sunday Poetry Series: Mark Cox and Crystal Simone Smith

Join us for our Monthly Poetry series, an afternoon of poetic readings. Featured poets will each read for 20 minutes, followed by a short break to sign books, then an open mic. Please sign up by 2:30 pm, and limit your reading to one poem, one page. Hope to see you there!

Mark Cox has authored seven volumes of poetry, the latest being Knowing (2024) and Readiness (2018), both from Press 53. He has a 40-year history of publication in prominent journals and his honors include a Whiting Writers’ Award, a Pushcart Prize, the Oklahoma Book Award, The Society of Midland Authors Poetry Prize, the NCPS Brockman-Campbell Award and numerous fellowships. Formerly the chair of the Creative Writing Department at UNC Wilmington, he has now retired after 39 years of teaching.

Crystal Simone Smith is an award-winning poet and educator.  She is the author of Runagate: Songs of the Freedom Bound (Duke University Press, 2025) winner of the Roanoke-Chowan Poetry Award, and Dark Testament (Henry Holt, 2023). In 2022, her collection of haiku, Ebbing Shore, won The Haiku Foundation Touchstone Distinguished Book Award. Smith is the recipient of a Duke Humanities Unbounded Fellowship. Her work has appeared in numerous journals including POETRY Magazine, Harper’s Magazine, Rattle, Frogpond, and Modern Haiku. She teaches in the Thompson Writing Program at Duke University.