This is the official blog of Northern Arizona slam poet Christopher Fox Graham. Begun in 2002, and transferred to blogspot in 2006, FoxTheBlog has recorded more than 670,000 hits since 2009. This blog cover's Graham's poetry, the Arizona poetry slam community and offers tips for slam poets from sources around the Internet. Read CFG's full biography here. Looking for just that one poem? You know the one ... click here to find it.

Monday, April 1, 2013

National Poetry Month: "Thank You Thank You" by Donald Hall from The New Yorker

Thank You Thank You

from The New Yorker


April is Poetry Month, the Academy of American Poets tells us. In 2012, there were seven thousand four hundred and twenty-seven poetry readings in April, many on a Thursday. For anyone born in 1928 who pays attention to poetry, the numerousness is astonishing; in April of 1948, there were fifteen readings in the United States, twelve by Robert Frost.

So I claim. The figures are imaginary but you get the point.
***

Whenever a poet comes to the end of a poetry reading, she pauses a moment, then, as a signal for applause, says, “Thank you,” and nods her head. Hands clap, and she says, “Thank you,” again, to more applause. Sometimes she says it one more time, or he does. How else does the audience know that the reading might not go on for six hours?

***

For better or worse, poetry is my life. After a reading, I enjoy the question period. On a tour in Nebraska I read poems to high-school kids, a big auditorium. When I finished, someone wanted to know how I got started. I said that at twelve I loved horror movies, then read Edgar Allan Poe, then… A young man up front waved his hand. I paused in my story. He asked, “Didn’t you do it to pick up chicks?”

I remembered cheerleaders at Hamden High School. “It works better,” I told him, “when you get older.”
***

It used to be that one poet in each generation performed poems in public. In the twenties, it was Vachel Lindsay, who sometimes dropped to his knees in the middle of a poem. Then Robert Frost took over, and made his living largely on the road. He spoke well, his metre accommodating his natural sentences, and in between poems he made people laugh. At times, he played the chicken farmer, cute and countrified, eliciting coos of delight from an adoring audience. Once I heard him do this routine, then attended the post-reading cocktail party where he ate deviled eggs, sipped martinis, and slaughtered the reputations of Eliot, Williams, Stevens, Moore…

Back then, other famous poets read aloud only two or three times a year. If they were alive now, probably they could make a better living saying their poems than they did as an editor at Faber and Faber, or an obstetrician, or an insurance-company executive, or a Brooklyn librarian.
***

In 1952, I recited aloud for the first time, booming in Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre from a bad poem that had won a prize. I was twenty-three. The London Times remarked on my “appropriately lugubrious voice.” When I first did a full-length poetry reading, three years later, my arms plunged stiff from my shoulders, my voice was changeless in pitch and volume, my face rigid, expressionless, pale—as if I were a collaborator facing a firing squad.
***

A question period for undergraduates at a Florida college began with the usual stuff: What is the difference between poetry and prose? Then I heard a question I had never heard before: “How do you reconcile being a poet with being president of Hallmark cards?” This inquisitive student had looked on the Internet, and learned that the man who runs that sentiment factory is indeed Donald Hall.

It’s a common name. Once before a reading a man asked me, “Are you Donald Hall?”

“Yes,” I said.

“So am I,” he said.
***

When my first book came out, in 1955, it was praised. I did a second book, my poems appeared in magazines—but nobody asked me to speak them out loud. I taught at the University of Michigan, which sponsored no readings. To my students, I recited great poems with gusto and growing confidence—Wyatt, Keats, Dickinson, Whitman, Yeats, Hardy—and worked on performance without knowing it. It was a shock when, late in the decade, a lecture agent telephoned to offer a fee for reading my poems at a college. It happened again, and I flew off on days when I didn’t teach. Michigan paid minimal salaries, and most teachers amplified their incomes by plodding to summer school. I stayed home and wrote instead of employing the Socratic method in a suffocating classroom.

As the phone kept ringing, I supposed that poetry readings were some sort of fad, like cramming into phone booths; I would enjoy it as long as it lasted.
***

When my generation learned to read aloud, publishing from platforms more often than in print, we heard our poems change. Sound had always been my portal to poetry, but in the beginning sound was imagined through the eye. Gradually the mouth-juice of vowels, or mouth-chunk of consonants, gave body to poems in performance. Dylan Thomas showed the way. Charles Olson said that “form is never more than an extension of content.” Really, content is only an excuse for oral sex. The most erotic poem in English is “Paradise Lost.”

In concentrating on sound, as in anything else, there are things to beware of. Revising a poem one morning, I found myself knowing that a new phrase was repellent, but realized it would pass if I intoned it out loud. Watch out. A poem must work from the platform but it must also work on the page. My generation started when poetry was print, before it became sound. We were lucky to practice both modes at once.
***

A chairman of English warned a friend of mine about her approaching audience. “They’re required to attend,” he said. “They don’t listen to anything. Sometimes in class I ask them to open a window, or to close it, just to see if they’re alive.” He sighed a deep sigh, as ponderous as tenure. “I don’t know what I’d do if The New Yorker didn’t come on Thursdays.”
***

It’s alleged that Homer said his poems aloud, though perhaps it was more like improv over centuries. Somewhat later, we learn, Tennyson read his poems to Queen Victoria, but we don’t know much more. In the nineteen-thirties, William Butler Yeats travelled by train from east coast to west, but the master of poetic noise didn’t speak his verses. At universities, to butter his bread, he read the typescript of a lecture called “Three Great Irishmen.” Maybe poets used to be paid not to say their poems?
***

By chance, I had been an undergraduate at the one college in America with an endowed meagre series of poetry readings. Eliot was good, but most performances were insufferable—superb poems spoken as if they were lines from the telephone book. William Carlos Williams read too quickly in a high-pitched voice, but seemed to enjoy himself. Wallace Stevens appeared to loathe his beautiful work, making it flat and half-audible. (Maybe he thought of how the boys in the office would tease him.) Marianne Moore’s tuneless drone was as eccentric as her inimitable art. When she spoke between poems, she mumbled in the identical monotone. Since she frequently revised or cut her things, a listener had to concentrate, to distinguish poems from talk. After twenty minutes, she looked distressed, and said, “Thank you.” When Dylan Thomas read, I hovered above my auditorium seat as I heard him say Yeats’s “Lapis Lazuli.” He read his own poems afterward, fabricated for his rich and succulent Welsh organ. I found myself floating again. In four American visits, from 1950 to 1954, when he died in New York, Thomas read his poems many times at many places, from New York’s Poetry Center through dozens of western colleges. Frost’s eminence among poetry readers disappeared for a time.
***

In a question period I launched into my familiar rant about dead metaphors, asserting that when “I am glued to the chair” equals “I am anchored to the spot,” we claim that a tugboat is Elmer’s glue. This afternoon, I was obsessed with dead metaphors of disability: the crippled economy, blind ambition, deaf to entreaties, the paralysis of industry, and…

At the end I summed up my argument. Guileless, I said, “All these metaphors are lame.”

Why was everyone laughing?
***

Late in the fifties, poetry readings erupted in the United States suddenly and numerously. Probably it was because of Dylan Thomas’s readings, though there was a gap before the volcano exploded. His popularity was not only on account of his voice or his verse. Thomas was a star, and most people came to his readings because of the Tales of Master Dylan—vast drunkenness, creative obscenity at parties, botched seductions, nightly comas—but if people attended because of his celebrity, at least they were going to a poetry reading. Maybe the explosion of readings was also because of a cultural change. Songs were no longer Tin Pan Alley, and the lyrics were worth heeding. When everyone listened to Bob Dylan, they heard lines that resembled poetry. When people heard memorable language sung from platforms, they became able to hear poems recited in auditoriums. The University of Michigan began to schedule poetry readings every Tuesday at 4 P.M. A gathering of students, sometimes three hundred, attended each week, and absorbed what they listened to. A few days after one reading, I met Sarah, a friend of my daughter’s. She recited a stanza from Tuesday’s poet. “You’ve been reading her books!” I said. “Oh, no,” she said. Sarah remembered the words.
***

Once, after a circuit reading, my driver left me at a house for a party. I would spend the night there, while he went to a motel to get some sleep, and he would pick me up the next morning at six. The party was good; the party was long. These were the days when people drank liquor. Our host drooped asleep on the sofa at 4 A.M., which was apparently his daily wont. I didn’t notice, because I was flirting with a pretty woman, whose husband stood dazed beside her, until he emerged into consciousness to attack me. His fist aimed at my jaw, but moved so slowly that I was able to duck. Three minutes later, we became friends forever, and at 6 A.M. I stood on the sidewalk, waiting for my escort to drive me to the next reading, the next party.
***

Poets love to tell stories about readings. After a woman friend performed in Mississippi one winter, a man handed her a heavy box of typewriter paper, saying, “I want to share my poems with you.” When she glanced through “Verses of a Sergeant Major, Ret.,” she found it unreadable. Telling me about it, she asserted that share has become a verb of assault disguised as magnanimity. “Unless you read my poems, I will gouge your eyeballs out.”
***

Bert Hornback ran the Tuesday readings in Ann Arbor, supplementing the English department’s pittance by appealing to university administrators for discretionary funds. After ten years of weekly readings, he burned out, and watched as the feckless department drooped to holding a reading a year. He decided to see what he could do by himself. On a January day in the eighties, he borrowed the university’s Rackham Auditorium, sold tickets for a joint poetry reading—five-fifty each, fifty cents for Ticketmaster—and invited some friends to do a joint reading: Wendell Berry, Galway Kinnell, and Seamus Heaney. On a Friday night—against a basketball home game, against the Chicago Symphony—Bert filled eleven hundred seats with paying poetry fans. The Fire Department permitted a hundred standing-room-only tickets, which sold out, and Bert added further S.R.O.s when the Fire Department wasn’t looking. Unexpected vanloads arrived from Cleveland, Chicago, Milwaukee, and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Each poet read for forty minutes, and after a break did ten minutes more. Outside, the crowd without tickets sulked and grumbled. It was said that scalpers charged as much as fifty dollars.
***

A Dodge festival in New Jersey was massive with poets, schoolteachers, and school kids. Each poet did panels, question periods, and readings. The first night, all twenty-five poets read, a few minutes each, to a crowd of three thousand. Nobody sitting at the back of the tent could have seen a poet’s face if the festival had not enlarged each visage on a screen like the Dallas Cowboys’. For closeups, the Dodge employed a black, jointed steel arm, a foot thick and fifty feet long, which curled and lurched its camera back and forth, grabbing each facial detail in its metallic tentacles. It looked as if it were searching for a source of protein.

A week after the readings and lectures of the festival, a recent Pulitzer poet received a thick letter from a woman in South Carolina who had fallen in love. The envelope was heavy with amorous poems, and she told him that there were ninety-five more, but she didn’t have the stamps. She attached a photograph of a mature woman in front of a ranch house, and implored him to fly down immediately. She sent an airline ticket with blank dates.
***

It’s O.K. to be pleased when an audience loves you, or treat you as deathless, but you must not believe them. If a poet is any good, how would the listeners know? Poets have no notion of their own durability or distinction. When poets announce that their poems are immortal, they are depressed or lying or psychotic. Interviewing T. S. Eliot, I saved my cheekiest question for last. “Do you know if you’re any good?” His revised and printed response was formal, but in person he was abrupt: “Heavens no! Do you? Nobody intelligent knows if he’s any good.” No honor, no publication proves anything. Look at an issue of the Atlantic in 1906; look at a Poetry from 1931. A Nobel Prize means nothing. Look in an almanac at the list of poets who have won a Pulitzer Prize; look at the sad parade of Poets Laureate.
***

Sometimes an audience is not three thousand. A friend of mine arrived at a hall to find that his listener was singular. They went out for a beer. I heard of another poet who showed up for a crowd of two. Gamefully, she did a full reading from the podium, and afterward descended to shake the hands of her crowd. One was dead.
***

When I was young, I could project, and now without a microphone I can’t be heard in the tenth row. It’s not only the debility of age. One’s range is diminished by habitual use of microphones. (When stage actors spend twenty years making movies, they are inaudible when they return to Broadway or the West End.) But there are advantages to artificial enhancement. There’s a poem in which I moo like a cow. Cows’ lungs are bigger than ours. I approach the microphone intimately, and softly but audibly moo as long as a cow moos. Proximity to the microphone saves my wind as I croon, mm-mmm-mmmmm-mmmmmmmm-ugghwanchhh. My friends say it’s the best line I’ve ever written.
***

After the group-talk of the question period comes the one-on-one. People line up for signatures. Sometimes the seeker dictates a dedication. “Say, ‘With love to Billy and his adorable wife, Sheila, who makes a great pound cake.’ ” The signer should demur, or at least edit. Everyone in line must spell a name, or “Felicia” turns out to be “Phylysha.” (Once, at a prep school, a boy asked me to write, “For Mom and Dad.” I told him my parents were dead, and we worked things out.) If there are just a few in line, the poet can speak with them as if they were people. If the line is long, it becomes impossible to distinguish one petitioner from another. At the end stands the host—the man who invited the poet to the campus, who picked her up at the airport, with whom she had lengthy conversation, who will give her the check, who hands her a book to sign—and she has no idea of his name.
***

Some readings prove memorable for a single eccentricity. On an occasion in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, an orchestra was finishing rehearsal in the auditorium as the poetry reading was due to begin. The introducer and the poet carried music stands into the wings. In London, a reading was to begin at 6 P.M. in the ancient Church of St. Giles in the Fields. Evensong prevailed. Another time, in the state of Chiapas, in Mexico, eight writers sat onstage waiting hours for the governor to arrive. A large audience had departed by the time he walked in, surrounded by bodyguards with machine guns. In fatigue, we each read to the governor for five minutes. “Gracias,” we said. “Gracias.”
***

As I limped into my eighties, my readings altered, as everything did. Performance held up, but not body; I had to read sitting down. When an introduction slogged to its end, I lurched from backstage, hobbled, and carefully aimed my ass into a chair. For a while, I began each reading with a short poem I was trying out, which spoke of being twelve and watching my grandfather milk his Holsteins. In the poem I asked, in effect, how my grandfather would respond if he saw me now. When I finished saying the poem, there was always a grave pause, long enough to drive a hayrack through, followed by a standing ovation. I had never received a standing O after a first poem; now it happened again and again, from Pennsylvania to Minnesota to California, and I thought I had written an uncannily moving poem. When I mailed copies to friends for praise, they politely expressed their dismay. I was puzzled and distressed until I finally figured it out. The audience had just seen me stagger, wavering with a cane, and labor to sit down, wheezing. They imagined my grandfather horrified, seeing a cadaver gifted with speech. They stood and applauded because they knew they would never see me again.

Donald Hall published his final book of poems, “The Back Chamber,” last autumn. This November, he will publish “Christmas at Eagle Pond,” about New Hampshire in 1940. He may be reached via e-mail.

Like poetry? Support "Holy Spoken Word," Necessary Poetry's 1st Anthology:

A multimedia anthology, showcasing the amazing writing, artwork, and spoken-word performance of the Necessary Poetry collective, a group of poets from Sedona, Flagstaff and Prescott.

Click here to help support our efforts on Kickstarter. A donation of even $10 or $20 gets us closer to our goal of our first publication and establishment of a nonprofit spoken word collective.



Wednesday, March 27, 2013

What does Necessary Poetry want to do?


Help support us on Kickstarter. Donate to help us publish Holy Spoken Word - Necessary Poetry's 1st Anthology: A multimedia anthology, showcasing the amazing writing, artwork, and spoken-word performance of the Necessary Poetry collective.

Click here to help support our efforts on Kickstarter. A donation of even $10 or $20 would do wonders to get us to our goal.

 The poets are some of the best in Northern Arizona:

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Visit Kickstarter and support "Holy Spoken Word" - Necessary Poetry's 1st Anthology

"Holy Spoken Word" is Necessary Poetry's 1st Anthology:

A multimedia anthology, showcasing the amazing writing, artwork, and spoken-word performance of the Necessary Poetry collective, a group of poets from Sedona, Flagstaff and Prescott.

Click here to help support our efforts on Kickstarter. A donation of even $10 or $20 would do wonders to get us to our goal.

Necessary Poetry is the collaborative effort of over 15 Arizona slam poets.

Sparked by a common love for written and spoken word, and a collective desire to inspire and motivate positive creative expression, we've joined together to publish a multi-media anthology of our best individual and cooperative creations - Holy Spoken Word. We are a passionate band of dedicated volunteers, and this stunning collection of words, artwork, and recorded performances is sure to seduce minds and ignite hearts everywhere.
BUT, POETRY IS BORING. Not this poetry! This poetry is raw. This poetry is relentless. This poetry captures smiles - it takes mouths hostage.

The poets are some of the best in Northern Arizona:


FAQ


  • Words are our religion... so in a way, yes. But in the way you probably meant it - um, no.
    The poetry submitted to Necessary Poetry may have religious themes or imagery from various traditions, but the project as a whole is secular and nonreligious. While some of the poets themselves may be religious or spiritual, others are secular, agnostic and atheist. The title "Holy Spoken Word" stems from the poets' belief that if anything is "holy," then surely it must be poetry and its power to connect peoples across time, languages, cultures, religious and spiritual or nonspiritual traditions.
  • Because everything is poetry. The way the rain falls, the way the light bounces off a glass, the way you cried hard when your first love dumped you because your freckles freaked him or her out... Inspiration can be found anywhere, and we're passionate about presenting ours in a way which connects us all on a human level. 
  • Hell, no!  Necessary Poetry's contributors have all agreed that any monies received from the sale of this anthology will be used to fund a series of workshops on writing and expression, and to support the efforts of aspiring poets and spoken word performers in our community.
    The hardworking poets hope to use those resources to fund workshops and efforts to bring poetry to a wider audience and encourage those who want to want to speak to find the poet and Holy Spoken Word within themselves, whatever that may be.

    Click here to help support our efforts on Kickstarter.

Monday, March 18, 2013

Josh Wiss wins the fifth Sedona Poetry Slam of the 2012-13 National Poetry Slam season

Josh Wiss wins the fifth Sedona Poetry Slam of the 2012-13 National Poetry Slam season, held March 17, at Studio Live in West Sedona.

Josh Wiss of Flagstaff and Phoenix, wins the fifth Sedona Poetry Slam of the 2012-13 National Poetry Slam season


Round 1
Random Draw

Calibration: Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona

Gary Every, of Sedona, 3:17, 24.5 (after 0.5 time penalty)
Tom Lamkin, of Chicago, 1:41, 23.0
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 3:23, 27.1 (after 1.0 time penalty)
Bradley Blalock, of Sedona, 1:46, 23.7
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 2:16, 26.3
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 1:57, 28.8

Teaser: Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona

Round 2
Reverse Order
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 1:40, 28.9, 57.7
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 2:22, 27.5, 53.8
Bradley Blalock, of Sedona, 2:30, 26.6, 50.3
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 1:35, 26.8, 52.9
Tom Lamkin, of Chicago, 1:02, 25.9, 48.9
Gary Every, of Sedona, 4:28, 26.0 (after 4.0 time penalty), 46.0


Host poet Christopher Fox Graham claims his Scots-Irish
heritage from Clan McElwee, from County Fermanagh,
in the province of Ulster.

Feature: Crìsdean Sionnach Greum for St. Patrick's Day


The March Sedona Poetry Slam falls on St. Patrick's Day, and will give the poets the added opportunity to celebrate two of Ireland's greatest contributions to the artistic world, poetry and whiskey.

Ireland is home to a numerous list of the world's best poets, including Jonathan Swift (1667–1745), Oscar Wilde (1845–1900), James Joyce (1882–1941), C.S. Lewis (1899–1963) and Patrick Kavanagh (1904–1967), three Nobel laureates: W.B. Yeats (1865–1939), Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) and Seamus Heaney (born 1939), as well as poet and revolutionary Pádraig Anraí Mac Piarais (1879–1916), one of the three leaders of the Easter Rising who was executed for his role in the rebellion that later led to Irish independence.

In celebration of his Irish heritage, Graham will host the slam and perform some Irish poems under his Gaelic name, Crìsdean Sionnach Greum.

Round 3
High to Low
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 1:12, 28.5, 86.2
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 2:42, 28.0, 81.8
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 2:50, 27.9, 80.8
Bradley Blalock, of Sedona, 1:23, 27.1, 77.4
Tom Lamkin, of Chicago, 1:28, 27.1, 76.0
Gary Every, of Sedona, 3:34, 26.2 (after 1.5 time penalty), 72.2

Sorbet: Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona

Victory: Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff

Final Scores
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 86.2

Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 81.8

Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 80.8

Bradley Blalock, of Sedona, 77.4
Tom Lamkin, of Chicago, 76.0
Gary Every, of Sedona, 72.2

Sedona National Poetry Slam Team
Slamoff Point Standings
12 points
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff✓✓
9 points
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff✓✓
The Klute, of Phoenix
7 points
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff
Joy Young, of Phoenix
6 points
Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona
4 points
Leo Bryant, of Richmond, Calif.✓
3 points
Charles Levett, of Phoenix
Jeremiah Blue, of Phoenix
2 points
Ashley Swazey, of Phoenix
Austin Reeves, of Flagstaff
Bert Cisneros, of Cottonwood
Gary Every, of Sedona
Lauren Perry, of Phoenix
Lynn Gravatt, of Sedona
1.5 points
Josh Floyd, of Flagstaff
Taylor Hayes, of Flagstaff
Valence, of Flagstaff
1 point
Bill Campana, of Mesa
Bradley Blalock, of Sedona
Houston Hughes, of Fayetteville, Ark.
Jackie Stockwell, of Flagstaff
Jasmine "Jazz" Sufi Wilkenson of Santa Cruz, Calif.
Jordan Ranft, of Santa Rosa, Calif.
Ky J. Dio, of Flagstaff
Lauren Deja, of Phoenix
Little Blue Lyon-Fish, of Phoenix
nodalone, of Flagstaff
Robert Gonzales, of Flagstaff
Rowie Shebala, of Phoenix
Slammy D, of Flagstaff
Susan Okie, of Washington, D.C.
Tom Lamkin, of Chicago
Vincent Vega, of Flagstaff

✓ = won a Sedona Poetry Slam

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Celebrate St. Patrick's day with a Sedona Poetry Slam on Sunday, March 17

Sedona’s Studio Live hosts a poetry slam on St. Patrick's Day, Sunday, March 17, starting at 7:30 p.m. hosted by Sedona poet Christopher Fox Graham.


Tickets are $10. On the day of the slam, tickets are $12. Click here to get your tickets now.


All poets are welcome to compete for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. The prize is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporter Jeanne Freeland.

The slam is the fifth of the 2012-13 season, which will culminate in selection of Sedona’s second National Poetry Slam Team, the foursome and alternate who will represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Boston and Cambridge, Mass., in August.

Slammers will need three original poems, each lasting no longer than three minutes. No props, costumes nor musical accompaniment are permitted.

The poets will be judged Olympics-style by five members of the audience selected at random at the beginning of the slam.

Poets who want to compete should purchase a ticket in case the roster is filled before they arrive.

The local poets will share the stage with 300 of the top poets in the United States, Canada and Europe, pouring out their words in a weeklong explosion of expression. Sedona sent its five-poet first team to the 2012 National Poetry Slam in Charlotte, N.C.

To compete in the slam, poets need at least three original poems, each three minutes long or shorter. No props, costumes or musical accompaniment are permitted. All types of poetry are welcome.

The slam will be hosted by Graham, who represented Northern Arizona on six FlagSlam National Poetry Slams in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010 and 2012.

Contact Graham at foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up to slam.

Host poet Christopher Fox Graham claims his Scots-Irish
heritage from Clan McElwee, from County Fermanagh,
in the province of Ulster.

St. Patrick's Day Slam


The March Sedona Poetry Slam falls on St. Patrick's Day, and will give the poets the added opportunity to celebrate two of Ireland's greatest contributions to the artistic world, poetry and whiskey.

Ireland is home to a numerous list of the world's best poets, including Jonathan Swift (1667–1745), Oscar Wilde (1845–1900), James Joyce (1882–1941), C.S. Lewis (1899–1963) and Patrick Kavanagh (1904–1967), three Nobel laureates: W.B. Yeats (1865–1939), Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) and Seamus Heaney (born 1939), as well as poet and revolutionary Pádraig Anraí Mac Piarais (1879–1916), one of the three leaders of the Easter Rising who was executed for his role in the rebellion that later led to Irish independence.

In celebration of his Irish heritage, Graham will host the slam and perform some Irish poems under his Gaelic name, Crìsdean Sionnach Greum.

What is Poetry Slam?


Founded in Chicago in 1984, poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets’ contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport, with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States, Canada, Australia and Western Europe.

All types of poetry are welcome on the stage, from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems, to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a “slam” poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain their audience with their creativity.

2013 Sedona National Poetry Slam Team


Competing poets earn points with each Sedona Poetry Slam performance between September and May. Every poet earns 1 point for performing or hosting. First place earns 3 additional points, second place earns 2 and third place earns 1.

Based on points, the top 12 poets in May are eligible to compete for the four slots on the Sedona Poetry Slam Team, which will represent the community and Studio Live at the 2013 National Poetry Slam in Boston. Poets can compete for multiple teams during a season and still be eligible to compete in the Sedona team.

For poetry slam standings, videos from past slams, and updates, visit foxthepoet.org. For poetry events in Northern Arizona, visit NecessaryPoetry.Com.

Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 the day of the event, available online at studiolivesedona.com.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

"A Compilation Love Poem," by Abby Meade and Stephanie Whitaker

Poets poking fun at other poets in a slam scene is a wonderful thing. This was a slam poem performed by two poets in the FlagSlam scene, performing in the style of the poets. Abby Meade's performance of Josh Floyd was the most spot-on.



Photo by Robert Chandler Gonzales
Abby Meade, left, and Stephanie Whitaker debut "A Compilation Love Poem" at the Cozy Slam.
A Compilation Love Poem
By Abby Meade - Stephanie Whitaker

Christopher Fox Graham: (read by Abby)
Even though I don’t remember your name, you meant something, and in that one night we spent together, your golden hair glinted in the moonlight.

Your eyes like daggers to my soul reminded me that I could never have you.

I know we met when we were 12, but braces looked cute on you, and you made cropped pants look cool.


Jackson Morris: (read by Stephanie)
Thanks, CFG, but I think I got it from here.

As I looked down at our intertwined fingers, I wanted to pinch myself, because who could love a self-deprecating geek like me?

Your sparkling blue eyes like pools rippled with thoughts I couldn’t read. I wanted to take you in my arms and protect you from the monsters in your dreams.


Josh Floyd: (read by Abby)
Girl, you deserve the monsters! You are worse than any nightmare I ever had.

I used to be a rapper, but even that didn’t hurt me as bad as you.

Now it’s just me and my first love: My skateboard.

Nothing you do is going to separate us.

 She fills the holes you punched into my soul.


Vincent Vega: (read by Stephanie)
I want to rip your heart out of your ribcage and watch it beat in my hand as the blood drips to the floor.

I love you like a horror movie, screams and pain and fear wrapped up in gore and tied with a cute pink bow.

The one you wear on Wednesdays.

The one I want to rip from your curls and tie around your neck so I can listen to you gasp for air.

Blue is a good color on you.


Christopher Fox Graham: (read by Abby)
You still sleep with the blue stuffed dog you had since kindergarten, and I was always jealous.

I wanted your full attention, but you… you had your own plans.

And when you left for college, even though we hadn’t spoken in months, it was like a weight off my shoulders.

I know you’re better off without me.


Jackson Morris: (read by Stephanie)
That night, we lay under the stars and listened to the chorus of crickets around us.

It was the perfect ending to our moonlit picnic, and though the blanket was a little itchy, when you pointed out Orion’s belt, I smiled.

When you think back on us, smile over the memories that might be a little bitter now, but are mixed in with the good ones.


Josh Floyd: (read by Abby)
The aftershocks of your words still ripple through me, like giants stepping through the cities of my mind.

The riot is over, but the wreckage remains I’m trying to clean up after you, but girl, earthquakes reverberate, and this one leaves me *gasp* breathless.


Vincent Vega: (read by Stephanie)
Your soul is too free, so I’ll lock you into a cage and watch you wither away, because I like skinny girls.

I’ll treat you like a woman should be treated: chained up and tortured with my love.

 I want to know that when I leave, you’ll still be there when I get back.

But I also want you to be comfortable, so I’ll only use the best handcuffs on you.

Because, baby girl, I love you.

Sunday, February 17, 2013

Ryan Brown wins the fourth Sedona Poetry Slam of the 2012-13 National Poetry Slam Season

Photo by Tara Graeber
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff, wins the Feb. 16 Sedona Poetry Slam.
Ryan Brown wins the fourth Sedona Poetry Slam of the 2012-13 National Poetry Slam Season.


Round 1
Random Draw

Calibration: Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona

Valence, of Flagstaff, 2:28, 25.9
Slammy D, of Flagstaff, 2:38, 25.5
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 2:24, 23.7
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 1:36, 24.8
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff, 3:11, 28.3 (after 0.5 time penalty)
Ashley Swazey, of Flagstaff, 3:02, 25.7
The Klute, of Phoenix, 2:58, 28.1
Ky J. Dio, of Flagstaff, 1:59, 24.2
Susan Okie, of Washington D.C., 1:38, 23.3
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 2:00, 26.1
Joy Young, of Phoenix, 2:31, 28.2

Teaser: Jeremiah Blue, of Phoenix

Round 2
Reverse Order
Joy Young, of Phoenix, 2:36, 27.3, 55.5
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 2:47, 26.3, 52.4
Susan Okie, of Washington D.C., 1:39, 23.3, 46.6
Ky J. Dio, of Flagstaff, 1:53, 25.2, 50.9
The Klute, of Phoenix, 2:40, 27.0, 55.1
Ashley Swazey, of Flagstaff, 2:31, 27.0, 52.7
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff, 28.2, 28.2, 56.5
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 2:10, 26.6, 51.4
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 3:06, 29.2, 52.9
Slammy D, of Flagstaff, 1:04, 25.9, 51.4
Valence, of Flagstaff, 2:02, 28.5, 53.4

Feature: Jeremiah Blue

Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16.
Jeremiah Blue is a Phoenix-based poet that has organized, hosted, and performed in the poetry slam scene since 2006. He has performed at a variety of venues throughout the country.

Currently, Blue co-hosts a weekly poetry slam in downtown Phoenix at Lawn Gnome Bookstore.

In 2007, he earned the title of Phoenix Poetry Slam Champion and has represented Phoenix twice at the National Poetry Slam. He also became the Individual Poetry Slam Champion for Phoenix in 2012, earning him the slot to represent the city at the Individual World Poetry Slam.

You can reach him on Facebook or you can email him at jsblue@gmail.com for more information or booking.


Round 3
High to Low
Sorbet:Verbal Kensington, of Flagstaff

Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff, 3:00, 28.5, 85.0
Joy Young, of Phoenix, 1:31, 28.5, 84.0
The Klute, of Phoenix, 1:53, 28.6, 83.7
Valence, of Flagstaff, 1:53, 28.1, 81.0
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 3:15, 27.6 (after 0.5 time penalty), 78.2

Sorbet: Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona

Victory: Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff

Final Scores
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff, 85.0

Joy Young, of Phoenix, 84.0 - Winner of the Sedona slot for the Women of the World Poetry Slam

The Klute, of Phoenix, 83.7

Valence, of Flagstaff, 81.0
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff, 78.2

Ashley Swazey, of Flagstaff,52.7
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff, 52.4
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff, 51.4
Slammy D, of Flagstaff, 51.4
Ky J. Dio, of Flagstaff, 50.9
Susan Okie, of Washington D.C., 46.6

Sedona National Poetry Slam Team
Slamoff Point Standings
9 points
Ryan Brown, of Flagstaff✓✓
The Klute, of Phoenix
8 points
Josh Wiss, of Flagstaff✓
7 points
Joy Young, of Phoenix
5 points
Evan Dissinger, of Flagstaff
4 points
Christopher Fox Graham, of Sedona
Jackson Morris, of Flagstaff
Leo Bryant, of Richmond, Calif.✓
3 points
Charles Levett, of Phoenix
Jeremiah Blue, of Phoenix
2 points
Ashley Swazey, of Phoenix
Austin Reeves, of Flagstaff
Bert Cisneros, of Cottonwood
Lauren Perry, of Phoenix
Lynn Gravatt, of Sedona
1.5 points
Josh Floyd, of Flagstaff
Taylor Hayes, of Flagstaff
Valence, of Flagstaff
1 points
Bill Campana, of Mesa
Gary Every, of Sedona
Houston Hughes, of Fayetteville, Ark.
Jackie Stockwell, of Flagstaff
Jasmine "Jazz" Sufi Wilkenson of Santa Cruz, Calif.
Jordan Ranft, of Santa Rosa, Calif.
Ky J. Dio, of Flagstaff
Lauren Deja, of Phoenix
Little Blue Lyon-Fish, of Phoenix
nodalone, of Flagstaff
Robert Gonzales, of Flagstaff
Rowie Shebala, of Phoenix
Slammy D, of Flagstaff
Susan Okie, of Washington D.C.,
Vincent Vega, of Flagstaff
0.5 points
Verbal Kensington, of Flagstaff

✓ = won a Sedona Poetry Slam

Friday, February 15, 2013

Get your tickets now for Sedona Poetry Slam tomorrow


Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16

The current lineup:
Ryan Brown
Talyne Corlyn
Ky J. Dio
Evan Dissinger
Sammy Dominguez
Lileana Fangz
Josh Floyd
The Klute
Taylor Hayes
John Quinonez
Austin Reeves
Jackie Stockwell
Ashley Swazey
Joy Young

Sedona's Studio Live hosts a poetry slam Saturday, Feb. 16, starting at 7:30 p.m. featuring Phoenix poet Jeremiah Blue and hosted by Sedona poet Christopher Fox Graham.


The Feb. 16 poetry is slam is also the qualifier for Sedona's representative to
the International Women of the World Poetry Slam
All poets are welcome to compete for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. The prize is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporter Jeanne Freeland.

The slam is the fourth of the 2012-13 season, which will culminate in selection of Sedona's second National Poetry Slam Team, the foursome and alternate who will represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Boston and Cambridge, Mass., in August.

The local poets will share the stage with 300 of the top poets in the United States, Canada and Europe, pouring out their words in a weeklong explosion of expression. Sedona sent its five-poet first team to the 2012 National Poetry Slam in Charlotte, N.C.

To compete in the slam, poets need at least three original poems, each three minutes long or shorter. No props, costumes or musical accompaniment are permitted. All types of poetry are welcome.

The slam will be hosted by Graham, who represented Northern Arizona on six FlagSlam National Poetry Slams in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010 and 2012.

Contact Graham at foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up to slam.

Jeremiah Blue

Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16.
Jeremiah Blue is a Phoenix-based poet that has organized, hosted, and performed in the poetry slam scene since 2006. He has performed at a variety of venues throughout the country.

Currently, Blue co-hosts a weekly poetry slam in downtown Phoenix at Lawn Gnome Bookstore.

In 2007, he earned the title of Phoenix Poetry Slam Champion and has represented Phoenix twice at the National Poetry Slam. He also became the Individual Poetry Slam Champion for Phoenix in 2012, earning him the slot to represent the city at the Individual World Poetry Slam.

You can reach him on Facebook or you can email him at jsblue@gmail.com for more information or booking.

Women of the World Poetry Slam Qualifier


This slam is also the qualifier for Sedona's representative to the International Women of the World Poetry Slam, to be held in Minneapolis from March 6-9. The highest ranked female or female-identified poet from earns Sedona's WOWps slot.

Eligibility: Poets who live their lives as women are eligible to participate in the Women of the World Poetry Slam. Competitors are eligible from certified venues or as individuals from areas without certified venues (a.k.a. “Storm” poets). Certified venues have a window of time to enter before individuals not associated with certified slams are able to enter. All certified venues must have a competition to determine their contestants.

All competitors must be PSI members in good standing and must agree to participate in the event following the rules of Slam as well as the Code of Honor, and must allow for PSI to videotape their performances for PSI owned product.

What is Poetry Slam?


Founded in Chicago in 1984, poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets' contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport, with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States, Canada, Australia and Western Europe.

All types of poetry are welcome on the stage, from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems, to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a "slam" poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain their audience with their creativity.

2013 Sedona National Poetry Slam Team


Competing poets earn points with each Sedona Poetry Slam performance between September and May. Every poet earns 1 point for performing or hosting. First place earns 3 additional points, second place earns 2 and third place earns 1.

Based on points, the top 12 poets in May are eligible to compete for the four slots on the Sedona Poetry Slam Team, which will represent the community and Studio Live at the 2013 National Poetry Slam in Boston. Poets can compete for multiple teams during a season and still be eligible to compete in the Sedona team.

For poetry slam standings, videos from past slams, and updates, visit foxthepoet.org.

Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 the day of the event, available online at studiolivesedona.com.

Studio Live is located at 215 Coffee Pot Drive, West Sedona. For more information, call (928) 282-2688.

Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Meet Necessary Poetry: A Multimedia Arts Collective in Flagstaff, Sedona and Northern Arizona


Necessary Poetry is a collaborative effort. Our mission is to inspire creative expression - we do this by encouraging the poetry in ourselves, each other, and anyone interested in connecting to the written and spoken word.

We believe everyone has a message or story to share with the world - and that it's all poetry. We root for the underdog. We're here to promote and support the work of authors, poets, and spoken-word artists of all ages and walks of life, whose words might not otherwise see the light of day.

We believe that poetry is necessary. We believe our words have weight. We're here to share our work with others, and to inspire and empower others to do the same.

Interested in learning more? Visit us here.

Monday, January 28, 2013

"How I Miss The Days When Hip Hop Was Fun" by IN-Q


How I Miss The Days When Hip Hop Was Fun
By IN-Q

Hey yo why is it so uncool to smile?
Since when did it become hip-hop's taboo?
Cuz I would be smilin' all the time,
If I made even half of the money you do.

Frownin' like you just caught a face-full of sun.
How I miss the days when hip-hop was fun.
When DJ Quik first burst on the scene,
When Boys in the Hood was on the big screen.
When Tupac Shakur was a dancer for Humpty,
When Nasty Nas 5 mic'd in the monthly.
When MC Breed painted the white house black,
When Too $hort retired and then came back...?
When Wyclef Jean asked out Mona Lisa,
That's the era this poem will feature!

I want to go to a show and not have to front,
I'd fist-a-cuff but I'd rather you pass the blunt.
Let's just chill and enjoy the diversity,
Let's get lost in the rhythm's uncertainty.

It doesn't make you less hardcore,
If you shake your ass on the fucking dance floor!
But somewhere along this road we made rules,
And smilin' became the weakness of a fool.
And silence and anger became the norm,
And that's when the party began to lose form.

I reminisce about the glory that's gone,
When happiness wasn't looked down upon.
When EPMD crossed over with the crossover,
When Tim Hardaway still had his crossover.
I used to go to the store and buy classics,
Now I go to the store and shit's plastic.

I can't call it 'I'm fiendin' for skill',
Cuz ya'll might be dope but I don't see your will.
All I see's Suckaz pretendin they're ill,
Snappin photographs with a barbeque grill.
Well, I can't relate to this lack of humanity,
Music's as vulnerable as insanity.

I remember when Phife was a sidekick.
When gangsta rap was still on the rise kid.
When De La Sol was re-incarnated,
When Freestyle Fellowship first circulated.
When Run DMC wore Adidas sneakers,
That's the era this poem will feature!

From '86 to '95,
When hip-hop was just too thick to describe.
I strived to become it in every way,
So I practice religiously every day.
On the bus ride home folks thought I was schitzo,
In 8th grade I wore more rayon than Sisqo!

Housin was in,
And Mr. Dobalina could've caught misdemeanor,
If he faked on his friends.
See, we would rap until we were bored,
With no cash advance or grammy award.
My boys' club trophies cluttered my shelf,
We'd no other reason than reason itself.

So why's it so uncool to smile?
Since when did it become hip-hop's taboo?
Cuz I would be simlin' all the time,
If I made even half of the money you do.

Frownin' like you just caught a face-full of sun,
How I miss the days when hip-hop was fun.
How I miss the days when hip-hop was fun.
How I miss the days when hip-hop was one!



Copyright © IN-Q



Los Angeles-based writer, rapper, actor, host, teacher, and award winning spoken word artist, IN-Q, is a unique voice in performance art. His work has been featured on HBO's Def Poetry Jam, The Battle for LA, BET, ABC, NBC, A&E, Disney, and Nickelodeon.

IN-Q is a National Poetry Slam champion who has shared the stage with everyone from De La Soul, to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, to President Barack Obama. IN-Q currently has a publishing deal with RMR Music Group and has collaborated with various artists including Rock Mafia, Sick Puppies, Aloe Blacc, Miley Cyrus, and Selena Gomez on her hit single, "Love You Like A Love Song," which went double platinum and reached No. 1 on the Billboard dance charts. 

Most recently, IN-Q co-wrote seven songs for the Disney hip-hop movie, "Let It Shine", including the singles, "Don't Run Away" and "Guardian Angel". His one-man show has toured nationally since 2009 and has been seen at over 50 universities across the country. His first full-length poetry CD, "When Two Worlds Collide," was released to critical acclaim. 

URB Magazine wrote, "IN-Q's brand of Hip-Hop, a penetratingly fluent account of what he's been through, paired with retro-funky sampling, is believable and heartbreaking even. His newest album puts true mastery of rhythmic-artistic-poetry on exhibit." 

An accomplished stage and screen actor, IN-Q has been seen in films like "The Magnificent Cooly-T" and "Speechless," and has television credits that include "The Cleaner," "Svetlana" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm." IN-Q's unique style of inspiring self-expression has been utilized by creative writing programs across the country. He teaches workshops in high schools, junior highs, universities, libraries, and prisons around California, as well as instructing yearly poetry programs to Upward Bound students at Long Beach Community College and UCLA Young Writers at their annual conference in Lake Arrowhead. 

IN-Q founded the Los Angeles based Actors' Lounge in 2004, a monthly open mic for actors held at The Greenway Court Theatre, and starred in the run of their original musical, Hercules on Normandie, for which he was given an observership at the prestigious Actors' Studio by Martin Landau.

Most recently, IN-Q starred in the premiere theatrical run of "Jumping the Median," an original play that was performed at the Santa Monica Playhouse and was produced by television legend Norman Lear. 

Friday, January 18, 2013

Poet Jack McCarthy, May 23, 1939 - Jan. 17, 2013



Jack McCarthy
Poet
May 23, 1939 - January 17, 2013
Jack McCarthy featured at the FlagSlam Semi-Final Slam on April 12, 2005. I remember he was quiet and gracious and delivered poetry in an unassuming, yet profound way.

He died Jan. 17, 2013, at the age of 73.

"He weaves wicker stories that creep slowly down the back stairs of your memory. He talks to you in your own voice." - Jim Dunn

This is still my favorite of McCarthy's poems, which can probably be said by slam poets around the country.

Careful What You Ask For
From "Actual Grace Notes," poems from 1996 to 2000

I was just old enough
to be out on the sidewalk by myself,
and every day I would come home crying,
beaten up by the same little girl.

I was Jackie, the firstborn,
the apple of every eye,
gratuitous meanness bewildered me,
and as soon as she'd hit me,
I'd bawl like a baby.

I knew that boys were not supposed to cry,
but they weren't supposed to hit girls either,
and I was shocked when my father said,
"Hit her back."

I thought it sounded like a great idea,
but the only thing I remember
about that girl today
is the look that came over her face
after I did hit her back.

She didn't cry; instead
her eyes got narrow and I thought,
"Jackie, you just made a terrible mistake,"
and she really beat the crap out of me.
It was years before I trusted my father's advice again.

I eventually learned to fight--
enough to protect myself--
from girls--
but the real issue was the crying,
and that hasn't gone away.

Oh, I don't cry any more, I don't sob, I don't make
noise, I just have hairtrigger tearducts, and always
at all the wrong things: Tom Bodett saying, "We'll leave
the light on for ya;" I cry at the last scene of
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

In movies I despise the easy manipulation
that never even bothers to engage my feelings,
it just comes straight for my eyes,
but there's not a damn thing I can do about it,
and I hate myself for it.

The surreptitious noseblow a discreet
four minutes after the operative scene;
my daughters are on to me, my wife;
they all know exactly when to give me that quick,
sidelong glance. What must they think of me?

In real life I don't cry any more
when things hurt. Never a tear at seventeen
when my mother died, my father.
I never cried for my first marriage.

But today I often cry when things turn out well:
an unexpected act of simple human decency;
new evidence, against all odds,
of how much someone loves me.

I think all this is why I never wanted a son.
I always supposed my son would be like me,
and that when he'd cry it would bring back
every indelible humiliation of my own life,

and in some word or gesture
I'd betray what I was feeling,
and he'd mistake, and think I was ashamed of him.
He'd carry that the rest of his life.

Daughters are easy: you pick them up,
you hug them, you say, "There there.
Everything is going to be all right."
And for that moment you really believe
that you can make enough of it right

enough. The unskilled labor of love.
And if you cry a little with them for all
the inevitable gratuitous meannesses of life,
that crying is not to be ashamed of.

But for years my great fear was the moment
I might have to deal with a crying son.
But I don't have one.
We came close once, between Megan and Kathleen;
the doctors warned us there was something wrong,

and when Joan went into labor they said
the baby would be born dead.
But he wasn't: very briefly,
before he died, I heard him cry.






Copyright © Jack McCarthy

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16


Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16


Sedona's Studio Live hosts a poetry slam Saturday, Feb. 16, starting at 7:30 p.m. featuring Phoenix poet Jeremiah Blue and hosted by Sedona poet Christopher Fox Graham.


The Feb. 16 poetry is slam is also the qualifier for Sedona's representative to
the International Women of the World Poetry Slam
All poets are welcome to compete for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. The prize is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporter Jeanne Freeland.

The slam is the fourth of the 2012-13 season, which will culminate in selection of Sedona's second National Poetry Slam Team, the foursome and alternate who will represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Boston and Cambridge, Mass., in August.

The local poets will share the stage with 300 of the top poets in the United States, Canada and Europe, pouring out their words in a weeklong explosion of expression. Sedona sent its five-poet first team to the 2012 National Poetry Slam in Charlotte, N.C.

To compete in the slam, poets need at least three original poems, each three minutes long or shorter. No props, costumes or musical accompaniment are permitted. All types of poetry are welcome.

The slam will be hosted by Graham, who represented Northern Arizona on six FlagSlam National Poetry Slams in 2001, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010 and 2012.

Contact Graham at foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up to slam.

Jeremiah Blue

Jeremiah Blue features at the Sedona Poetry Slam on Saturday, Feb. 16.
Jeremiah Blue is a Phoenix-based poet that has organized, hosted, and performed in the poetry slam scene since 2006. He has performed at a variety of venues throughout the country.

Currently, Blue co-hosts a weekly poetry slam in downtown Phoenix at Lawn Gnome Bookstore.

In 2007, he earned the title of Phoenix Poetry Slam Champion and has represented Phoenix twice at the National Poetry Slam. He also became the Individual Poetry Slam Champion for Phoenix in 2012, earning him the slot to represent the city at the Individual World Poetry Slam.

You can reach him on Facebook or you can email him at jsblue@gmail.com for more information or booking.

Women of the World Poetry Slam Qualifier


This slam is also the qualifier for Sedona's representative to the International Women of the World Poetry Slam, to be held in Minneapolis from March 6-9. The highest ranked female or female-identified poet from earns Sedona's WOWps slot.

Eligibility: Poets who live their lives as women are eligible to participate in the Women of the World Poetry Slam. Competitors are eligible from certified venues or as individuals from areas without certified venues (a.k.a. “Storm” poets). Certified venues have a window of time to enter before individuals not associated with certified slams are able to enter. All certified venues must have a competition to determine their contestants.

All competitors must be PSI members in good standing and must agree to participate in the event following the rules of Slam as well as the Code of Honor, and must allow for PSI to videotape their performances for PSI owned product.

What is Poetry Slam?


Founded in Chicago in 1984, poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets' contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport, with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States, Canada, Australia and Western Europe.

All types of poetry are welcome on the stage, from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems, to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a "slam" poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain their audience with their creativity.

2013 Sedona National Poetry Slam Team


Competing poets earn points with each Sedona Poetry Slam performance between September and May. Every poet earns 1 point for performing or hosting. First place earns 3 additional points, second place earns 2 and third place earns 1.

Based on points, the top 12 poets in May are eligible to compete for the four slots on the Sedona Poetry Slam Team, which will represent the community and Studio Live at the 2013 National Poetry Slam in Boston. Poets can compete for multiple teams during a season and still be eligible to compete in the Sedona team.

For poetry slam standings, videos from past slams, and updates, visit foxthepoet.org.

Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 the day of the event, available at Golden Word Books and Music, 3150 W. SR 89A, and online at studiolivesedona.com.

Studio Live is located at 215 Coffee Pot Drive, West Sedona. For more information, call (928) 282-2688.

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

"The Names of Trees," by Christopher Fox Graham, music by Robert Gonzales


Music by Robert Gonzales, recorded 12-31-2012 in Flagstaff, Arizona

The Names of Trees

By Christopher Fox Graham
before we named the trees
we feared the dark
ran from the shadows
monsters stalked us
in daytime’s tall grasses
and nighttime’s nightmares

we feared fire most of all
it ate the unnamed trees alive
its breath choked the beasts we hunted
we could not hold it
and could not fight it
just fear it

but one of us
The First of us
saw an infant spark
and treated it like a child
she learned to wield it
our first tool
brought it into the caves
and taught us not to fear
but use it
to chase away the monsters

fire is always the same
because a flame is never the same
from moment to moment
by always changing
the flame never changes

with fire
we learned to control the shadows
we danced them onto cave walls
where we trapped the monsters in ocher and ash

we used the fire to keep the beasts away in the night
to cook the bounty gathered from the earth
and roast our meat from the day’s hunt

and with bellies full
in the glow of the fire
we learned language
around campfires
as our elders told stories
of their young days long passed
they told us the names of trees:
oak
ash
banyan
pine
bodhi
fir
palm
cedar
sugi
cypress
they spoke of the strong mothers who raised them
the great hunts of their brave fathers
how they leaned ways to teach us these things

they told us
of ancestors who had long since turned to bones
and were now dust
who had sprinkled themselves across the heavens
to watch over us
always
glowing in the dark
like flames in the night

when the fire in their own hearts
began to flicker
they asked us to built fires to mourn their death
help ascend their bodies
so they could watch over us from new stars
alongside their ancestors

around the fire
we learned to structure nouns and verbs
into rhythm and beat
rhyme and stanza
turning the articulation of breath
the staccato of consonants
the tone and pitch of air in living lungs
into the art of poetry
stories we could pass from generation to generation
long after the first lungs to hold them
were silent beneath the dirt
we still tell some of those stories
passing along the poetry
of heroes
who are no longer bones
no longer dust
but vapor in the wind

around the fire
we passed on what we had learned
to the children who would mourn us
consider these frail lifeless bones still sacred
because they once held them
in their infancy

long after our bones turned to dust
and the dust turned to vapor
and the vapor exhaled by something new
they would remember … us
in the stories around the fire

a ribbon of flesh and fire
tied us to the infant spark
that The First one of us
held without fear

fire is always the same
because a flame is never the same
from moment to moment
by always changing
the flame never changes

it is consumption and combustion
a moment of reaction
between earth and air
the tangible and ethereal
in a spark of life
never the same from one second the next

nothing is eternal but change
so our civilizations learn to adapt
like tongues of flame
growing together or apart
rising and falling
expanding and shrinking
dancing in a campfire

we sometimes forget that lesson
so our empires defy it
our monuments stand against it
our great cities are abandoned
for new homes
Sumeria
is now just artifacts
Assyria
has become Scrabble word
31 dynasties ruled Egypt,
each falling to the next
the dream of Rome
became a dream again
the sun never set on the British Empire
until the day it did
and young America too
will grow old into history books
but the fire will still be the same
because a flame is never the same
from moment to moment

even now
in the glow of digital screens
behind the wheel of combustion engines
or miles above the earth
in steel aircraft
or space stations
we are still mesmerized by the flame
we gather around fireplaces on holidays
remembering the ancient reasons for things
we light wax candles for dead loved ones
hoping whispered words
might rise to their ears in the heavens
where they watch us
alongside ancestors

we find ourselves
still captivated by campfires
staring into them
unable to look away sometimes
while we tell stories
just like we used to
when home
wasn’t made from stone and brick
or animal skins from last year’s hunt
but the warmest cave
on our nomadic trek
following the herds
teaching our children
the names of trees

some day
when we no longer fear the dark
a descendant of the flame that first warmed us
as we lay dreaming of stars
will help send a few of us
beyond the reach of Earth
never again to see this home
more will follow
using flickers of fire
to pass the boundaries
break the laws of gravity
that we will refuse to obey any longer
and sail across the night
unafraid of the monsters we left behind
trapped on cave walls beneath ocher and ash
they will make their homes
on marbles of every color
swirling in the dusty arms of space
and in the wildernesses of new worlds
they will name new trees
tell stories around campfires of ancestors
strong mothers
brave fathers

fire is always the same
because a flame is never the same
from moment to moment
by always changing
the flame never changes

some day
when “human”
means something else entirely
and whomever we become
sails on the winds of supernovas
finds no fear exploring black holes
the last place darkness can hide from us

they may communicate the poetry quasars and quarks
with the same beauty as verbs and nouns
but still stare at the surface of suns
and without explanation why
know the fire burning before them
is still wonderful to witness
because in the glimmer of a memory
dancing with the arithmetic of orbiting atoms
and the geometry of galaxies
they can feel something deep in their bones
tying them like a ribbon of flesh and flame across time
to a tiny world
whose name they have forgotten
or can no longer pronounce
and remember
somehow,
ancestors who wielded an infant spark
to no longer fear monsters or the dark
but listen around the first campfire
to poetry
and stories
and the names of trees