Community

This whole 5×3 idea that Taylor came up with for the National Poetry Slam – 5 teams, 3 POEMS per bout as opposed to 3×4, or the more recent 4×4 – isn’t necessarily the death of Nationals as some have lamented. It is, however, a flawed band-aid that emphasizes the competition in a way that has the potential to divide local scenes more than the usual inanity inherent to the format. It is also indicative of PSI’s failure to coalesce as a legitimate organization.

One of the bigger problems with this system is the fact that it was insitituted THIS year, completely untested beyond a last-second dry run between meetings a couple of weeks ago. Add to that the fact that now up to 80 teams can compete but it’s still first-come, first-serve registration with minimal requirements^* for certification. Instead of making room for new slam scenes for previously unrepresented areas, I bet many of those additional 16 slots will go to larger areas’ B and C teams. Teams started by or made up of veteran carpetbagging poets that bounce around a particular region attempting to qualify for as many teams as possible.

As for the 3 POEMS distinction, it wouldn’t be an issue if that translated to 3 POETS per team. Unfortunately, in their wishy-washy, John Kerry-like manner, they voted to amend Taylor’s proposal to allow slammasters to decide locally whether to send 3, 4 or 5 poets. And there’s nothing mandated that this be determined at the beginning of the season. In other words, if popular Joe Veteran comes in 4th or 5th place, that slam will likely send a 4- or 5-poet team. If unpopular Eddie Newbie takes that 4th or 5th spot, though, that slam has the option to claim broke and choose to send a minimal 3-poet team instead. Given PSI’s spineless penchant for staying out of local issues, this is a senseless can of worms to have opened.

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So I’m trying to finish this new piece [have I mentioned Acentos is tonight?] that came out of nowhere a little over a week ago and I go to open it up in Word a few minutes ago and I notice another file cryptically named “post,” last modified on 5/14/2003. Curious, I open it and find this:

My father thought holding my head under the water was the best way to teach me to hold my breath and, ultimately, to swim. To this day, I cannot swim.

This is obviously something we will never agree on, though.

Competing against you or any other “veteran” in a slam doesn’t make anyone better unless you’re suggesting that the points actually mean something and who “wins” is representative of something other than the subjective opinions of five random people. I know if Shawn or Claudia had made the team, no one would be saying they were better writers than those they beat, they’d be complaining that the judges I picked sucked.

What makes people better writers is encouragement and honest critique and the opportunity to have their voices heard and an encouraging environment to develop those voices.

I didn’t become a better writer during my year at the Nuyorican because I slammed against writers that were “better” than me, I got better because of the supportive community that existed there, encouraging me to get better, telling when something I wrote was crap. It was also a community that constantly wrote and performed new work because the “veterans” were no longer competing, they had stepped up to the next level and became mentors.

The experience of Nationals, in particular, isn’t about developing to the point where you can take out Billy Collins in a head-to-head competition. Nationals is nothing more than a step, an EARLY step, in a poet’s development process. At least it SHOULD be.

Instead, it seems to have become this ego-driven, cutthroat

It ends there, followed by the thread of emails I was responding to, all part of the internal debate about the slam that ultimately led to my officially stepping down from the louderARTS Project six days later. If I remember correctly, I’m pretty sure I knew I was done with them as I was writing that email.

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