Friday, January 29th marked the end of SPOKES’ winter hiatus, hosting their first poetry slam of the new semester. This beloved Tri-co group has many students who write for fun, read their poems for fellow students, and compete on the campus, regional, and national levels.
The night began with a few technology struggles, but both performers and audience members felt the show must go on! Finally, around 8:30 PM, the first “open mic[rophone]” poet came to the stage. For those who don’t know, open mic sessions are not judged and are for students who simply like to share their work without feeling the pressures of competition. Occasional snaps were heard throughout the audience as each of the four open mic poets shared emotional experiences.
Noura Jaber (BMC ’17) gracefully took the stage as host for the night and introduced renowned poet Sanam Sheriff (BMC ’18) as the sacrificial poet to start off, and set a baseline for, the rest of the slam. Her poem was heartfelt, tragic, and touching. The audience snapped, clapped, whooped, and hollered. After the noise settled down, round one of the slam officially began with Noura herself reading her own original piece, centered around her strength as an individual, and how sometimes it’s hard to remember to “dare to be powerful”.
Aqil Rogers (Drexel ’17) put vivid images in the minds of the audience members about the daily battles of people with dark skin, but remains steadfast to the truth that “black skin is beautiful in it’s incandescence and that black pride is it’s song”. The end of his poem, Chapter One, the crowd is left stunned for a moment before erupting into applause. Sophia Brown (BMC ’19) followed with an intense untitled poem about the emotional struggles of dealing with mental disorders, ultimately surviving. The slam continued with the next poet, Mary Sweeney (BMC ‘18), with a short poem ending with the powerful line: “people are deeper than they appear”. George Abraham (Swarthmore ’17) takes a different approach, with quite a long poem about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that so closely touches his soul. Finishing off the round was Emily Spiegel (BMC ’18) with a poem regarding the “debt for the sin of womanhood/still paying for an apple I never took a bite of” and her refusal to apologize for being a beautiful, unashamed woman.
A quick break for a little bit of score calculations, and the second round began. This time some heavy poems were mixed in with some humorous ones (Sophia’s poem about geese made all in the audience burst out laughing!) Scores were again calculated and averaged to figure out the winner. Top three scores belonged to George, Noura, and Sophia, who also took home the title of “goose-slayer”.
Some of the fantastic Bryn Mawr poets are going to compete in the College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI) in April. Congratulations to Shreekari Tadepalli, Noura Jaber, Sophia Brown, Sanam Sheriff, and Carol Bowe! This team is looking for your support! Donations to help fund their trip to Austin, Texas for this national competition are much appreciated. Visit CUPSI for more information about the competition itself, and check out SPOKES’ gofundme to get some cool freebies for your monetary support.