Last night, I competed in a venue called the Booth Playhouse. The venue was a long skinny room, faculty lounge style, seats set up in rows with an aisle down the middle . The venue was mic-less, and I was glad Sophia has been making me project even in our tiny hotel room generic viagra. I was in the early bout, and our bout was in a different building than the others viagra online. We were on the third floor of a shopping mall generic cialis. As you walk into the building, you are forced onto an escalator viagra online pharmacy. It takes you up to a large plaza style floor, tiled, with TERRIFYING ANIMATRONIC BEARS singing Christmas Carols cialis. If you don't get eaten by the gaudiness that is Animatronic Bears, you take another escalator to the Booth Playhouse, where you enter, take a set of stairs, and are in the venue.
The poets in my second bout, in the two minute round, in this order:
Renaissance
G
Lucky Seven
Emily Rose
Will Evans
Brandi MacDonald
Ayinde Russel
Melissa May
AJ Krebs
Gypsee Yo
Teresa Davis
Chad Anderson
I think this was the best national bout I've ever been to. Every poet did great work. Each poem succeeded in the way it was trying to. I enjoyed most of the poems. I had a blast. I don't have specifics, really, but I was impressed across the board. The judges were rewarding good poetry, but also were into confessional pieces and fast talking. I used New Years Eve With Arturo, knowing it wasn't really playing to the judges. I offered a good performance, and took eleven out of twelve in the round, putting me second to last in the second round, with three minute poems.
I had missed the score for Renaissance, who took the twelve, so I thought I would be closing out the bout. That's pretty much my favorite place to be - I like what I say on stage to be the last thing anyone hears. Going second to last, I didn't quite get that effect, but since I had been preparing for it, I knew I was going big. I dialed it in with the best performance I have ever given of Cheyenne. I cannot think of a better way to end competing at my first IWPS. I put so much into that poem, and when I finished, I left the room crying. I love it when I read a poem and don't care about the scores, and that was exactly how I felt.
Apparently, the judges felt the same, because I ended up taking the twelve in that round. Again, I was consistently impressed with the poems my competitors threw up, and I was glad to be able to compete in a bout with so many passionate people. Gypsee Yo's three minute poem really hit hard for me, especially a line (which I can't even begin to do justice) about how hard it is to represent yourself through English as a non-native speaker. It gave me chills.
I then headed over to Brixx for 2for1 appetizers and pizzas with eight wonderful people. It was delicious, the people were great, the music was eighties themed, the conversation was really positive and wonderful. I had a phenomenal time. Sophia and I headed back upstairs and were still debating about whether to hang out with people or go to bed when we fell asleep.
Tonight is finals, where we'll be watching:
Zak Corsi
Rudy Francisco
Sasha Langford
Jesse Parent
Gary Johnson
Chancelier Xero Skidmore
Houston
Tre G
G
Alvin Lau
Tara Hardy
C.P. Maze
compete for the IWPS Champion title. Gypsee Yo will be sacrificing. I am so excited. Slam bingo will commence (and I'm putting the word "aphrodisiac" in a square. I'm also still waiting to here the "TSA frisking poem"... come on poets, don't let me down!) and there will be merriment. I'm also wearing black and silver sparkly clothes.
I'll let you know what hits hard. Also, exclusive interviews still upcoming.
From IWPS, Bout 2 Highlights
From IWPS, Bout 1 Highlights
We're still having a blast. We have managed to leave our overly comfortable beds a couple of times, to eat delicious collards, visit baby cousins, hang out with lots of poets, and compete in bouts. Today promises adventuring toward thrift stores. But you're here to hear about the bouts:
My first bout was in a huge theatre. Raised stage, proscenium, hundreds of seats. There were about 30 audience members and about six pairs of hands that clapped the entire night. I have never been in a room so dead. The sac, Gabe, did a beautiful poem about a man with Alzheimers in a nursing home to start the night. I don't have a great memory for poetry, so I can't tell you much about what other people did; I know that most of what I did was sit in the audience, feeling so nervous I actually was afraid I might throw up. I went fourth in the bout with Section 12. I walked onto stage trying to look confident, feeling so shaky. I fixed the mic. I started my poem, and have absolutely no idea how I did. About halfway through the poem, I started to regain some semblance of control over my muscles, and I have a vague recollection of the second half of the poem. I had a very hard time making eye contact (I have literally never preformed on a raised stage with the house lights up) but when I walked off stage, people (poets) told me that it was incredible. As soon as I finished, relief washed over me. I sat in the audience and actually listened to the rest of the poems! Sierra DeMulder followed me with a well preformed persona piece about school shooting. The highlight of round 1 was Shappy with Whale Song for my Bastard Son. He was the only poet to get a response out of the audience, and we were certainly laughing hard. Lucky Seven also read a funny piece, a rewrite of "The Sky Is Falling" story, with really well made rhyme and a great ending that didn't go anywhere.
The second round, from high to low, placed me second to last in the round. The audience was still dead. In fact, the audience was dead for everything except Shappy. In the one minute, he threw up Vegetarian in the Zombie Apocalypse, with the same boisterous laughter as his first poem. Laura Yes Yes read a great poem about being black which ended with "look how much poem I've made without mentioning lynching." I threw up Boy, as I had planned to. It is a beautiful poem, and I did it justice, but it was the wrong poem for the room. I took the 12, giving me a first night ranking of 23. With two poems down and two to go, we headed up to the room for a youtube lady gaga marathon. Chilling in our comfortable beds led to us falling asleep, and so ended day 2 of IWPS.
From IWPS
In the soft-pillowed mires of hotel room 807, awesome coach Sophia Holtz and your IWPS rep AJ Krebs are listening to Explosions in the Sky and Feeling Like We're Going to Throw Up workshopping madly to prepare for tonight's bout.
November 23rd: Open Mic - Featuring Michael Fitzgerald!
It's almost the end of the year, which means homework is piling up and the weather is behaving like a drunk squirrel. Now, rather than stay indoors and be lonely, we want you to come to this show. Not only can you use it to hang out with people who are awesome, you can read on the open mic! Or play a song with your guitar/ukulele! Or, just listen! Listening is also great.
And, as if that weren't incentive enough, we're also ...going to be bringing out a featured performer for you all. His name is Michael Fitzgerald, and if previous viewings of our features have kept you up at night with the sheer power of their greatness, then don't be surprised when it happens again this week! While his work is thick with metaphor, it's as accessible as anyone could want them to be [and that says a lot!].
Here is his bio! "Michael Fitzgerald has been writing. He has lived in Massachusetts his whole life and it is one of a handful of things that he loves for honest, along with his first car, his mother and the coast of aforementioned state. He reads. All his favorite authors used to be the favorite authors of girls he thought he loved for honest - his favorite bands remain his own and always will. He is the books and the albums and the odd angled winding of the roads he has known - from here, to there and ever folding back."
Don't be a jerk. Come out. ♥
