We were about to taste the glory of victory, a first place win. Everything we practiced for all summer happened in this slam. We got the rotation we wanted. We even got control of the slam early with a two point lead. But it’s poetry slam and anything can happen.
SlamMN’s powerfully performed poem in the Two spot, celebrating the noble struggle of the working class in America, brokeout the scoring by 3.3 points. We used the Three spot to present Brother Said’s poem for his daughter “Naima’s Poem”, but the poem only cut into SlamMN’s lead by 1.8 points. The judges didn’t seem to be accepting poems with personal themes, so in the second round we put up what we call affectionately “The Roach Poem”. We stole the breakout from SlamMN by 2 points. We were in the lead! But we gave it away in the 3rd round with a duet with a performance that was not well executed. We closed with Savannah’s powerful performance of her ode to her grandmother which sealed our second place showing. Overall, we’re disappointed because we could have gotten 1st. But the 2nd place finish is a vast improvement over last year.
Bout #4 at All Asia – National Poetry Slam Results:
SlamMN (Minneapolis) -105.9
Houston – 103
The Fuze (Philidelphia) – 99.7
Mill City (Lowell, MA) – 95.9
Night Two:
In an earlier draft I said the judges in Boston were hard. Actually it was CAMBRIDGE, which is right over the Charles River from Boston. Most of the bouts were in Cambridge and the scores for most bouts there were incredibly low – including the bouts the Houston teams were in. We weren’t lucky enough to be in the one venue in Boston where scores averaged higher – but that’s the National Poetry Slam: you never know what kind of venue you will be in. In our second preleminary bout, Savannah got a 24. 3 first poet up for one of the best performances I’ve seen her give. Rain tore the roof off and got a 25.7. The judges were with Fort Worth from beginning to end, though. We struggled with Denver for 2nd right up to the last round, but Denver had position on us and their final poem was a TKO. We ended up in 3rd place. But we made the group piece finals!
Bout #27 at The Lizard Lounge Bar – National Poetry Slam Results:
Fort Worth -108.9
Denver Mercury – 104.7
Houston Poetry Slam – 102
Tombstone – 93.6
Group Piece Finlas with the Houston Slam Team@ the National Poetry Slam
We pulled one in a ten team slam. We were eliminated in the 1st round with a 24.2 on a team piece we got 28.7 on earlier in the week. The venue was crap. The staff was rude. If you’re ever in Cambridge don’t go to the Middle East. It’s one of the most terrible businesses I’ve been in. In general they don’t believe in the concept of customer service here. They don’t have to, All the rich ass yuppies swing their money around even for a bowl of lettuce. We’re looking forward to getting back home and preparing for the Nationals in Charlotte next year. Thanks for your support.
Total Rank for the 2011 Houston Slam Team @ the National Poetry Slam:
37th out of 76 teams.
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