Slam Poetry Article

What is slam poetry? Is it poetry that you slam or poetry that has been slammed? Well it is neither. Slam poetry is a type of poetry where the reader performs an original poem that expresses a personal struggle or story. Often it is shared through a poetry slam which is a competition often the performances are then judged on a numeric scale by previously selected members of the audience.

 

Shane Koyzcan is one of these slam poets. His poem "To This Day" describes the difficulties that children can have growing up. The theme of his poem is to show the world what bullying can do to children and how the effect that it can have on people even as they grown up. He uses an analogy to compare the pecking order of the children to those of a circus. The pecking order went "from acrobats to lion tamers from clowns to carnies" in high school and the circus. His objective in this poem is to show the effects that bullying can have on children and how what is said to them can stick with them forever and does so in a manner that is easily relatable.    

 

 Taylor Mali is another one of these poets. He depicts the struggles of school from the teacher’s perspective in his poem “What Teachers Make”. Mali is unhappy that teacher’s jobs are based on what their income is. The theme of the poem is that the outcome of younger generations is more important than the income of older generations and those younger generations need to be respectful and persevering individuals.  Throughout the poem Mali uses puns and figurative language. When his guest asks how much he makes instead of replying with his salary he says that he can "make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor" and "an A- feel like a slap in

 the face”. He also makes the comment “it’s also true what

 they say about lawyers" to his dinner guest whom is a lawyer.

Mali is passionate and takes pride in his work and believes, “teachers make a goddamn difference!”

 

Another one of these poets is Sarah Key. Her poem Poem: B she shares the way she would raise her daughter. She would protect and comfort her throughout her whole life. The theme is that no matter what happens to stay positive and find the good in things. Key uses good diction throughout her poem to help form imagery. She wants her daughter to be unique and different than other children. By “[painting] the solar system on the back of her hands so that she has to learn the entire universe”

her daughter is gaining knowledge. She also shows how she would bond with her daughter and teach her. Key also shows how protective she is when she tells her daughter “don’t keep your nose up in the air like that” because she may “follow the trail back to a burning house…to see if [she] can save…[the] boy who lost everything” because she doesn’t want her to have   a                   “heartbreak chocolate can’t fix”.

 

Slam poetry is an interesting way for individuals to express their opinions in a unique and entertaining way. Whether it is for a competition or just to justify a point slam poetry is an exceptional way for poets to express a personal struggle or to story. These three poets are extraordinary in their use of diction and terminology.