2008 Woodie Awards
Poets battle with words in Sam's slam
By Sonya Harvey
Issue date: 9/14/07 Section: Premiere
Originally published: 9/13/07 at 7:18 PM CSTLast update: 9/13/07 at 8:27 PM CST
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Under Sam's Burger Joint's crimson lights, local poet David Hendler mixes a verbal cocktail, one part politics, one part personal experience.
"Overpopulation keeps the latest Harry Potter book checked out of the library, overpopulation is the reason MTV doesn't play videos anymore, overpopulation voted for Bush ... twice," Hendler recites from memory as his three-minute explosive rant about TV and politics spills over the crowded house. On Sept. 4, the battle for the PuroSlam 2008 National Team held its first of four semi-final rounds as the top 10 poets from the last four months battled it out with some intense verbal action.
The top two wordsmiths secured finals spots, taking them one step closer to their National Poetry Slam dream.
Mo Martin, a former theater and sociology student from this college, is one of the finalists at this night's poetry slam.
She's competing against Noah Finn, another talented poet who attends the University of Texas at San Antonio, whose wordplay takes a different tack, to be finalists considered for the 2008 Poetry Team.
At a poetry slam, five members of the audience are chosen by a master of ceremonies to act as judges for the event. After each poet performs, each judge awards a numeric score to that poem.
Scores generally range between a low of zero and a high of 10. The highest and lowest score are dropped, giving each performance a rating between zero and 30 points.
Most slams last multiple rounds, and many involve the elimination of lower-scoring poets in successive rounds. Poetry slams feature a broad range of voices, styles, cultural traditions, and approaches to writing and performance.
PuroSlam is the only nationally certified poetry slam operating in San Antonio. Started in 1999 by Ban Ortiz, PuroSlam has earned a national reputation as one of the toughest, roughest, rowdiest poetry slams in the United States, bringing the exciting world of performance poetry to South Texas on a weekly basis.
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