Crystal Simone Smith

Replacement Theory

My bar friend does not say who he voted for. He says that too many top-tier University seats are going to foreign, not American students. He tells me it’s because they are easier to teach. I suggest that he ask my opinion, rather than tell me his theory as I’m the only educator in our conversation. He refuses so I don’t tell him about the student that visits my office and sits in long, quiet intervals. Who, in slivers of English, tells me that he recently completed his year of mandatory military training in China. That I am asking him to do the unthinkable in his argument essay: question authority. How in this office, in these campus walls, this country, his world is askew.

public gardens
in the splendor of itself
water lily

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About the Author

Crystal Simone Smith is an award-winning poet, indie-publisher, and educator. Her books include Runagate: Songs of the Freedom Bound (Duke University Press, 2025) and Dark Testament (Henry Holt, 2023). Her haiku collection Ebbing Shore won a 2022 Touchstone Distinguished Book Award. She teaches in the Thompson Writing Program at Duke University and writes about the human condition and social change.

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