CSU Writing Center Poetry Slam

Third Annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam!

2009-04-25T20:44:00.003-05:00

With two wonderful MCs (Dr. Lape and Jarred Wiehe) to entertain the audience and twelve talented poets, this year's poetry slam was another great success! Here are the winners and honorable mentions:

First place: Jarred Wiehe

Second Place: Felicia Harris

Third Place: Kevin Ramirez

Fourth-Place Honorable Mention: Kristin Taylor

Fifth-Place Honorable Mention: LaSa'da Williams

Sixth-Place Honorable Mention: Brooke Cosby

We would like to thank everyone who came to slam their poetry, making the third annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam the great event that it was. We would also like to thank everyone who came out to support the slam poets. We look forward to seeing everyone again next year!

Third Annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam!

2009-03-11T20:37:00.004-05:00

2009 Poetry Slam
sponsored by
The CSU Writing Center

All you need to know:

When is the slam?
Friday, April 3 at 6:00

Where is the slam?
The Carson McCuller's House

1519 Stark Avenue

What is a poetry slam anyway?

A poetry slam is pretty much the best thing you can do to bump up your cool points. If you think you're the greatest poet EVER and you're just waiting on everyone else to know it too, then this is the event for you! In a nutshell, poetry slam is the competitive art of performance poetry that focuses on the way a poem is spoken and heard, as opposed to the way poetry is viewed on the page. If you're still staring blankly at your computer screen with one eyebrow raised and a quizzical thought-bubble suspended above your head, then check out the video below.

What are the rules?

Though rules vary from slam to slam, the basic rules are:

Poems can be on any subject and in any style.
Each poem must be of the poet's own construction.
The poet may not use props, costumes, or musical instruments.

How does a poetry slam work?
All registered poets (see below for registration information) will have their name placed in a bucket. MCs will randomly draw names to determine the order in which poets are to perform. Poets will have three minutes (plus a ten-second grace period) to perform one poem. If a poet goes over this time limit, points will be deducted from their total score (-.5 point for every ten seconds beyond the time limit). After each performance, poems will be judged, on a scale of 0 to 10, by a panel of five randomly selected judges. From these five scores, the high and low scores will be dropped and the middle three will be added together, giving the poet a total score of 0-30. Depending upon the level of participation, it is likely we will have a second round of poems. Therefore, it is recommended that all poets come prepared to perform two poems. In the second round, the top five poets will perform their second poem, which must be a different poem than the one performed in the first round. In the second round, poems will be judged in the same manner as the first round, although scores from the second round will stand alone. The poets with the top three scores from the second round will win the top three prizes, respectively.

Who can participate?
All CSU students, regardless of major, are invited to participate. In fact, enough interdisciplinary interest may spark a little healthy competition between the colleges. We like to think of it as a battle-of-the-majors of-sorts. Can you beat the English-Lit. kid? :)

How do I participate?
ALL POETS MUST REGISTER BY FRIDAY, March 27, 2009. NO EXCEPTIONS!
Register quickly, as space is limited and places will be reserved on a first-come, first-served basis.
To register, send an email to koch_kelly@colstate.edu with "Poetry Slam Registration" as the subject line and include ALL of the following information:

Your name
Your major
A short sentence or two about yourself, just so the MCs can give you a little introduction
The title of your first poem
State that you have read and agree to the official poetry slam rules as posted above.

Why should I participate?
Besides the opportunity to share your poetry with others and the sheer fun we will have, there are some great prizes to be won. Some professors may even be willing to give extra credit to students who participate in and/or attend the slam. Rumor has it that the students who organized this event and sponsoring professors will appear in funny hats, so miss out on the fun at your own risk.

A special word of thanks goes to our sponsors:

Carabba's Italian Restaurant

Chef Lee's

Columbus Coffee Company

CSU Bookstore

CSU Student Affairs

Starbucks

Photos from the second annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam!

2008-04-28T20:42:00.005-05:00

The second annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam was a huge success. Check out more photos here.

Second Annual Wham Bam Poetry Slam

2008-03-27T21:20:00.008-05:00

2008 Poetry Slam
sponsored by
The CSU Writing Center

All you need to know:

When is the slam?
Friday, April 25 at 7:00

Where is the slam?
The Carson McCuller's House

1519 Stark Avenue

What is a poetry slam anyway?

What are the rules?

Though rules vary from slam to slam, the basic rules are:

Poems can be on any subject and in any style.
Each poem must be of the poet's own construction.
The poet may not use props, costumes, or musical instruments.

How does a poetry slam work?
All registered poets (see below for registration information) will have their name placed in a bucket. MCs will randomly draw names to determine the order in which poets are to perform. Poets will have three minutes (plus a ten-second grace period) to perform one poem. If a poet goes over this time limit, points will be deducted from their total score (-.5 point for every ten seconds beyond the time limit). After each performance, poems will be judged, on a scale of 0 to 10, by a panel of five randomly selected judges. From these five scores, the high and low scores will be dropped and the middle three will be added together, giving the poet a total score of 0-30. Depending upon the level of participation, it is likely we will have a second round of poems. Therefore, it is recommended that all poets come prepared to perform two poems. In the second round, the top five poets will perform their second poem, which must be a different poem than the one performed in the first round. In the second round, poems will be judged in the same manner as the first round, although scores from the second round will stand alone. The poets with the top three scores from the second round will win the top three prizes, respectively.

Who can participate?
All CSU students, regardless of major, are invited to participate. In fact, enough interdisciplinary interest may spark a little healthy competition between the colleges. We like to think of it as a battle-of-the-majors of-sorts. Can you beat the English-Lit. kid? :)

How do I participate?
ALL POETS MUST REGISTER BY FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 2008. NO EXCEPTIONS!
Register quickly, as space is limited and places will be reserved on a first-come, first-served basis.
To register, send an email to koch_kelly@colstate.edu with "Poetry Slam Registration" as the subject line and include ALL of the following information:

Your name
Your major
A short sentence or two about yourself, just so the MCs can give you a little introduction
The title of your first poem
State that you have read and agree to the official poetry slam rules as posted above.

Wham Bam Poetry Slam!

2007-02-23T19:05:00.000-05:00

With eleven talented poets, a supportive crowd, and entertaining MCs, it's no wonder the 2007 Poetry Slam: For the Love of Poetry, sponsored by the CSU Writing Center, was a great success!

The crowd eagerly waits for the festivities to begin.

Believe it or not, we actually had four MCs:
Dr. Lape (a.k.a. Norizzle), Kindall Scarborough (a.k.a. Kindizzle),
Professor Jones, and Lamb Chop.

Kindizzle and Norizzle

Professor Jones, Norizzle, and Lamb Chop

The Writing Center family, otherwise known as the "peops"

Congratulations to all who slammed their poetry!
Sydney Lanier, Lloyd Eugene Dunlap, Tiffany Billins, Rebecca Rae Olds, Felicia Harris, Leslie Rader, Azul Bushie, Kristin Taylor, Erick Richman, Derik Roberts, and Charles Watkins
Thank you for participating.

Meet the Winners

All slam finalists will be invited to perform their poetry in the Honors Colloquium on Saturday, April 28, 2007.

Kristin Taylor, First Place
Final Score of 28.95

Sing

“Sing me that song,” he says,
“The one you wrote yesterday.”
So I sing for him
because he’ll say my song is beautiful,
but these are the things he whispers when no one else is around.

I’m thinking
it must be something unusual
to say our kiss is just
his mouth and my mouth meeting.
I’m thinking
it must be something unusual
to say our kiss
just makes me feel so small next to his years.
But I try for him
because I want him to want me,
because he’ll say my mouth tastes lovely—
like something to be devoured.
His just tastes like alcohol.

Maybe that’s why the rest of it happened;
I don’t know.
Or maybe I am the one to blame.
But do you know what it’s like?
Do you know what it’s like
to sit there
as he unties your halter-top
and you’re praying that he’ll stop
but he doesn’t?
You’re unable to move with
his tongue on your skin just that—
a tongue sliding on your skin—
his hands just hands slithering on your body
until he overtakes you.

“Sing me that song,” he says.
“Please, no,” I say, but…
but he is too strong for me.
He demands this time:
“Sing!”
as he forces,
entering me anyway.
So I sing.

© Kristin Taylor

Derik Roberts, Second Place
Final Score of 28.75

Mine is a land

Mine is a land
Where princesses spend treasures on tattered tubes of denim with empty pockets.
Where knights gallop over stale water on fiberglass stallions,
Over waves that were never wild nor fierce. Predictable.

Where the golden sun
smiles
and the shimmering ocean
laughs,
but your gaze is fixed on empty riches and false fame.

Where all is a silly dance, a masquerade concealing injury.
Scars long hid, but not forgotten. Hopeless.

Where life bears countless questions that no one stops to ask
And where love has no more substance than the vanishing foam on the sea.

God is not lost. Men are.

Well this so-called American dream is starting to sound like a nightmare to me
And I’ll call them out, I’m tired of these lies.
My first allegiance is not to a flag… not to a country… not to a man…Its not to democracy and its not to blood it's to a King and a Kingdom.
Am I un-American now?

Am I laughable to you?
We’ve forgotten Our first loveYeah I said we.
And made it nothing more than pretty pictures of crosses and doves
And about as useful and relevant as string cheese.

Now let’s take a journey. Pretend your living for a living, Pretend that inside your skin you’ve got a friend who’s willing to give you everything you ever wanted and gave up everything He’s ever been to do so.
And here’s what I need you to believe now.
Believe that here stands a man that pretends not to fall apart.
Who still gets scared sometimes when it’s dark.
Who gets so nervous that his lips peel back in terror.
Who doesn’t have all the answers but loves with abandon none-the-less,
So God-solid scared that you’re gonna wanna talk about tomorrow again.

Maybe we have more in common than you thought.

With borrowed verse
we’ve got to stop acting like nothings happening,
When we’ve got six billion daunting truths,
Setting six billion different suns on you.
But we six billion gods, we’re all still up in arms
about what its going to take to follow through again.

Enough with truths, there are two great lies that i’ve heard: “the moment you eat from that tree, you won’t die. Gods holding out on you.” and one more;
that Jesus Christ was a white, middle-class republican and if you wanna be saved you have to learn to be like them.
Predictable.

That’s not my gospel. That’s not my Savior.
No it’s far more exciting than that.

Well mine is a land where there is hope
and life
is in community.
Where love reigns and all those cliché ridden words you’ve heard before mean something.
Where we are sons and daughters of The Beloved King and my adulterous heart is found restored.
Where a man died so that I could live and not because I’m worthy, no no, because He loves me.

He did not come to bring religion. He came to proclaim Freedom. He came to bring Life.
Where the divine is within reach and a man is wearing the scars that save. Revolution is

NOW.

© Derik Roberts

Charles Watkins, Third Place
Final Score of 28.43

Channel Surfing

Click
The Damage here along the gulf coast is catastrophic…
Click
There is a frantic effort to find…
Click
The same idiots who can’t get water to a destroyed American city…
Click
There is an uncounted number of dead…
Click
There are buses on the way to New Orleans to bring those…
Click
Refugees are being shown here in front of what looks like…
Click
A third world country…
Click
With no food or water, I fought for my country…
Click
In Baghdad, they air drop water and food…
Click
George Bush doesn’t care about…
Click
The refugees down in New Orleans are dying in…
Click
What used to be the home of the Saints is now a…
Click
Symbols of death now pervade the city where…
Click
The Superdome is now the final resting place for those trapped…
Click
In a city best known for Mardi Gras the people…
Click
Have begun to walk from New Orleans to Baton Rouge because…
Click
Their government has failed them…
Click
In an effort to control the tidal surge caused by Katrina…
Click
George W. Bush has finally made his way to New Orleans where he found…
Click
Television only tells part of the story of…
Click
Unrecovered and unknown dead bodies are floating through the streets…
Click
Of this once proud city need your help, please don’t turn off your…
Click

Felicia Harris, Honorable Mention
Final Score of 27.86

A Song Entitled Deep

What we have is deep…. You see/
I want to write a song about you and sing it with my heart/
I want you to compose the music and orchestrate it with my body parts/
I want…. no better yet I take that back I need/
I need for you to be on stage front and center with me
Because you see…. You’re the only half that makes mine complete/
And when they write our music down it won’t be expressed as half notes and wholes…. /
It’ll be more like she sang with his heart and he played with her soul/
And the title will be ‘Deep’/
Written by us/
Inspired by true love and not just by lust/
See what I have for you is deep - /
So deep that it goes way past my heart and down into the innermost parts of me/
So deep that its no longer something you can see…. It’s something you can feel/
Letting you know that it’s something far more than real/
See we got something… we got something here/
Something like the audience can close their eyes and ears and listen with their bodies/
And they’ll ask us how we did it and I’ll say –
Oh it’s just a few tricks love taught me/
See we got something here/
Something like your mind thinks my thoughts/
And I’m finding things you sought/
Back when/
I was you and you were me/
Sort of like a twisted game of hide-n-seek/
Like I planted the puzzle/
And you just happened to stumble/
Across the piece that fit with me/
Way back then/
Back when/
God determined destiny/
The roots of our relationship going down deep past you and me/
So our song would be a history created melody…. /
Yea we got something here…/
We got something deep…. ///

© Felicia Harris 04/28/2003

Erick Richman, Honorable Mention
Final Score of 25.84

Confusion?

Confusion?
Confusion burns,
Like a torch, in your mind,
made to scorch neurons and neutrons and electrons and...what...wait...what?

Confusion inspires,
Cathedral spires, funeral pyres and abandoned tires,
creating liars and dragging us down into mires of muck, yuck, and and
wait wait what?

Confusion tears,
Like a pen, dragged through a paper scripting hate for the world stage,
just so we can wage wars based on lores of cages and wages and wait wait
what?

Confusion hungers,
Eating away confidence and ripping apart conscience,
like a grown man’s cries choking on his own tie or an anorexic's thighs
tossing down grapes like cyanide,
I’m running inside running ragged running wait wait what?

Confusion drives,
Lost kids to search for escapes and highs in weed and dope
and don’t say you don’t want to hear this
when obese 12 1/2 year olds in miniskirts are chugging cherry cough syrup
take a break take a look from confusion and you’ll see what’s so sick
and wrong in society that i
drivel, rant, and rave and waste entire days coming up with
flurries of my righteous lyrical fury about the
lost hope that one day we may raise ourselves above the horrors of

Confusion,
cause confusion burns...um..confusion tears..nah...confusion..drives
confusion...

Confusion needs to end.
Cause nowadays, people think that thoughts are a rarity,
but as sure as I'm alive that's just a fallacy,
because everyone who wants has the ability,
to rise up above confusion,
and find clarity.

© Erick Richman

Let us know your thoughts.
In the words of Dr. Lape, "The Writing Center is of the people, by the people and for the people." So we're interested in what you have to say. Did you have a great time at the slam? Would you like the Writing Center to host another slam next year? Leave a comment on our blog, and let us know.

calling all poets . . .

2007-01-26T22:27:00.000-05:00

2007 Poetry Slam: For the Love of Poetry
sponsored by
The CSU Writing Center
in celebration of
International Writing Center Association Week

All you need to know:

When is the slam?
Friday, February 16 at 2:30

Where is the slam?
In the CSU Writing Center (116 Woodall Hall--across from the library)

What is a poetry slam anyway?

What are the rules?

Though rules vary from slam to slam, the basic rules are:

Poems can be on any subject and in any style.
Each poem must be of the poet's own construction.
The poet may not use props, costumes, or musical instruments.

How does a poetry slam work?
All registered poets (see below for registration information) will have their name placed in a bucket. MCs will randomly draw names to determine the order in which poets are to perform. Poets will have three minutes (plus a ten-second grace period) to perform one poem. If a poet goes over this time limit, points will be deducted from their total score (-.5 point for every ten seconds beyond the time limit). After each performance, poems will be judged, on a scale of 0 to 10, by a panel of five randomly selected judges. From these five scores, the high and low scores will be dropped and the middle three will be added together, giving the poet a total score of 0-30. Depending upon the level of participation, it is likely we will have a second round of poems. Therefore, it is recommended that all poets come prepared to perform two poems. In the second round, the top five poets will perform their second poem, which must be a different poem than the one performed in the first round. In the second round, poems will be judged in the same manner as the first round, although scores from the second round will stand alone. The poets with the top three scores from the second round will win the top three prizes, respectively.

Who can participate?
All CSU students, regardless of major, are invited to participate. In fact, enough interdisciplinary interest may spark a little healthy competition between the colleges. We like to think of it as a battle-of-the-majors of-sorts. Can you beat the English-Lit. kid? :)

How do I participate?
ALL POETS MUST REGISTER BY FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2007. NO EXCEPTIONS!
Register quickly, as space is limited and places will be reserved on a first-come, first-served basis.
To register, send an email to compton_bethany@colstate.edu with "Poetry Slam Registration" as the subject line and include ALL of the following information:

Your name
Your major
A short sentence or two about yourself, just so the MCs can give you a little introduction
The title of your first poem
State that you have read and agree to the official poetry slam rules as posted above.

Why should I participate?
Besides the opportunity to share your poetry with others and the sheer fun we will have, there are some great prizes to be won. Take a look at the local businesses (listed below) which have been kind enough to donate prizes. Some professors may even be willing to give extra credit to students who participate in and/or attend the slam. Rumor has it that the students who organized this event and sponsoring professors will appear in funny hats; miss out on the fun at your own risk.

Please support our donors!

MovieStop

Columbus Coffee Company

Waldenbooks
f.y.e.
Carmike Cinemas

CSU Bookstore

Special thanks to:
Dr. Noreen Groover Lape and Professor Tyrone Jones
for their assistance in organizing this event.

This slam was organized by
Chelsea Bullock, Bethany Compton,
Kindall Scarborough and Kristin Taylor,
students in the CSU Honors Program.