Last year in Lanark County a spoken word movement started. It was the beginning of the rural poetry slam. Within a year the valley slam poets were able to compete and raise the money to send the first rural slam poetry team to the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word, in Calgary, November 5-9th. The poetry slam helped to create a community of spoken word artists that span from Perth, Smith Falls, Almonte, Tay Valley and Carleton Place. A collective grew up out of a common goal. Now this year the newly formed Lanark County Live Poets Society seek to do it all over again. Starting with THREE poetry slams in the month of March.

Now remind me what is a poetry slam?

It all started in Chicago, 1986, when a man named Mark Smith decided that he wanted to democratize poetry. He endeavoured to remove the piece of paper from the poet and force them to engage with their audience. It started in a boxing ring, with poets performing memorized poems to the cheers and boos of the crowd. Today it is a mostly standardized competition involving five random judges selected from the audience to score the performing poets. The poems must be original material, under three minutes in length and are to be performed without any props. They are judged based on both the content and the performance itself. There are slams taking place in most major cities across the country. They have seasons, like basketball, and at the end of the season four poets are selected based on their scores to represent their city at the national festival. It's an exciting process, and starting in March the slam series will be making it's mark in the Ottawa Valley. In the end the four top participating poets will head to Calgary to represent as the first rural community at the national festival.

Now we need your help to get the word out!
PLEASE SHARE WIDELY

Perth Slam
Friday March 13th
7-9 pm
Factory Grind 1 Sheerbrooke St E
open mike and competition
For more info contact b!Wilder at coyotedreamer22@hotmail.com

Carleton Place Slam Monday March March 23rd
7-9pm
17Albert Street, 257-8715
Carleton Place Cinemas, Carleton Place
Featuring Ruthanne Edwards: storyteller extraordinaire and Hosted by Rusty Priske of Ottawa's Capital Poetry Collective
For more info contact stop.rewind@hotmail.com

Smith Falls slam
Monday March 30th
6:30-9:30 at the Bakery Cafe,
6 Russel W, Smith Falls
Jonny d will host and feature
For more info contact Jonny D at jfmdavidson@gmail.com