2026 Hyla Brook Reading Series
EXCITING NEWS! The Hyla Brook Reading Series has found a new home at the Hyla Brook Estate and we’re throwing a party to celebrate! Join us on May 14 for refreshments and a cash bar as we welcome our first reader, Anna Lena Phillips Bell.
Right next door to the Frost Farm, Hyla Brook Estate is a 9-acre garden estate, and the readings will be held on their brand-new patio. The estate is extremely convenient, with paved parking, same-level restrooms, and evening lighting. Join a community of poets and poetry lovers to hear nationally-acclaimed poets read their work.
Except for August, readings begin Thursdays at 6:30pm, include a reading by a Hyla Brook poet before the featured reader and are followed by an open mic. All readings are free and open to the public. For easy reminders, click the icons at bottom of the page and follow us on social media.
Kickoff Party with Anna Lena Phillips Bell — Thursday, May 14, 6:30pm
Anna Lena Phillips Bell is the author of Might Could, winner of the Anthony Hecht Prize, Ornament, winner of the Vassar Miller Prize, and the chapbook Smaller Songs, from St Brigid Press. New poems appear in Sewanee Review, Orion, Literary Hub, and Poetry London. Bell teaches at UNC Wilmington, and is the editor of Ecotone.
Meg Kearney — Thursday, June 11, 6:30pm
Meg Kearney’s ninth book, Cardiac Thrill, was published in fall 2025; her previous collection, All Morning the Crows, won the 2020 Washington Prize and spent six months on SPD’s poetry bestseller list. Meg is founding director of the Solstice MFA Program at Lasell University in Massachusetts. Visit https://megkearney.com. (Photo credit: Gabriel Parker)
Claudia Gary — Thursday, July 9, 6:30
Claudia Gary’s new poetry collection, Time and Other Solvents, is a story of healing. She teaches Sonnet, Villanelle, Persona Poem, Meter, etc., at The Writer’s Center and privately, via teleconference. She’s also an advisor at New Verse Review, as well as a health/science writer, visual artist, and composer. Visit pw.org/content/claudia_gary.
James Matthew Wilson — Thursday, Sept. 10, 6:30pm
James Matthew Wilson is the Cullen Foundation Chair in English Literature and the founding director of the MFA program in Creative Writing at the University of Saint Thomas. The author of sixteen books, his most recent collection of poems is Saint Thomas and the Forbidden Birds (Word on Fire, 2024).
