Electric City Invitational Poetry Slam @ Magnificent Seven, Aug. 3

Last night I had the pleasure of judging the inaugural ECC poetry slam featuring some of my favorite local poets.

It was a difficult task to judge mostly because I respect each of them. Anyone easily could have won the competition.

Ultimately, I felt Ian Court was the deserving winner. His first poem brought out captivating, harsh and real emotion that felt what it would be like to be a cougar shredding through its prey.

I don't believe he was speaking about his mother in the poem. It was, however, about SOMEONE's mother, and he had a lot to say that was well-presented, authentic and touched the audience in a way that as a poet you strive to do with anything you write.

The difference, I feel, between a decent poem and a great poem, is taking the emotion of a rant, exploring it and creating something literary that makes that feeling blossom into art.

Plus, a great performance poem sticks with your listeners.
I'm sorry to admit it, but I've already kind of forgotten what some of the poems were about. A good poem, to me, is one that you remember days after hearing it.

On that note, I really enjoyed Jeff's opening poem about his unborn child. It was sweet, direct, full of intriguing metaphors and phrases, and in Jeff-fashion, leaves you with a sense of "hey, all right, maybe life isn't so bleak."

What more can you say about Jeff's poetry? He's established his voice, and it shines through every piece he reads, much like Krystine's. Her expressive voice is well-established. The intruigue comes when she does something new...much like everyone. Her writing and performing are both equally moving.

It came as no surprise, then, that Krystine had her game ready for her new poem.
I felt it really touched on hope and optimism nicely.
Perhaps the only down side to reading a new piece is that it's not quite as polished. But, that, to me, is an acceptable trade-off because you're presenting something unique for the very first time. I guess I value that over something that we've heard several times before delivered excellently.
Similarily, if Krystine reads her piece again, I look forward to seeing how she improves upon it. :-)

Sarah Raines, who took second place, read a piece about a man and a woman and how while they're connected in some deep way, they'll never be involved in something messy, which relationships tend to be. It's kept, as she puts it "clean and dry," which works on the literal sense, they're at one point standing out in the rain, and the figurative one.

That dual meaning takes a certain amount of literary magic to make it work. Her repetition of the phrase "Clean and Dry," cuts to the heart nicely. That, added to her ability to deliver the piece, made her an easy choice for the second round.

She had a couple of flubs performing her second piece, which was a bit unfortunate given that the rest of it was delivered excellently. I felt she may have won the slam if she performed her third piece, Proof, second, as it was touching and really made a connection with the audience. The fact that it was totally off-the-cuff and full of emotional pauses really added to the effect.

Traci Rosenbaum's poem, I felt, was the best written one of the night. I gave her a 10 in the literary category. Her performing was a little flat, which happens. Several times I've written what I felt were great pieces..on the page. Then, however, when I go to the mic and perform them, they come out not as powerful as they seemed on the screen while I was typing them.

That happened a bit with Traci's poem, I felt. Her performing is strong, but firstly, she is a wonderful writer. She makes me a little jealous, truthfully, because I've heard several of her poems and they're always quite moving. :-)

Allen Lanning's piece about Montana getting it right was thought provoking. It was bold, strong and to the point. At times it felt it was a bit too much on the storytelling side vs. the poetic side, but it had plenty of strong, well-crafted language.

Allen's poem made me think of what a real poem should be. How does one tell the difference between a rant, a poem and a short story? Should there be a way to seperate them? They're all poems in the sense that they're being performed on stage at a poetry slam. But, can a poem be a strong opinion delivered with flare? Can a poem be a string of obscenities repeated every sixth word?
Or, is a poem only something that follows an established formula such as Iambic Pentameter or a Haiku?
It's an interesting discussion, and one I'm not sure there is a right answer to.

Finally, Anissa impressively made the final round despite not knowing she was supposed to be performing!

 For whatever reason, I had a bit of a hard time hearing her first poem, but she was extremely engaging. Her mannerisms are wonderfully natural and draw in you with laser-like focus. She's grown as a poet by leaps and bounds, which is impressive given that she was a great poet already.

Like Sarah Raines, she flubbed a bit on her second poem. It wasn't that noticable, but in a competition those are the little things that stand out. It didn't take away from the message or emotion, however.

Her third poem, which, I was happy we got to hear, was also perhaps her strongest. The final line, which I might be paraphrasing incorrectly was, "How can dying be so beautiful?" was probably the best closing line of the night.
 Choosing between her and Sarah for second place was the hardest ruling to make. If I had to pick one over the other 10 times in a row, I'd probably go back and forth every time.

If you're a fan of poetry, like I am, you had plenty to love about the Poetry Invitational. A diverse mix of poets delivering new shit, old shit and wonderfully unscripted shit left for a great night out on Machinery Row's patio.

I look forward to the next one, and hopefully this event helped raise more awareness in the community that the poetry scene here isn't some overnight fad.

And that, I feel, was the biggest success of the night.