by Michelle Booker
The Nuyorican Poets Cafe in New York City was eerily quiet when junior Justyn Telfair and senior Kari-Indigo Mathews arrived April 6 to compete in the semi-finals of the 16th Annual Urban Word NYC Teen Poetry Slam. They knew from their previous visit to the small but legendary venue, that the atmosphere would soon change.
Justyn, Kari, sophomore Chyna Lewis and I had traveled to the Nuyorican March 22 to compete in a preliminary round. We knew that if we made it through the preliminary round to the semi-finals, we would then have a chance to make the finals at the world-famous Apollo Theater in Harlem.
When we approached the venue, we knew that this was going to be different than any of our school slams or open mics. When we received our poet passes, we were ecstatic because the poet passes showed that we were officially competing. As we marched inside the building, we filled out little slips of paper with our stage names. Finally, we all sat down together and the show began.
After the first few poets performed, the crowd began to get excited and competitors who hadn’t performed yet were getting more anxious. The poetry club began to wonder who in our group was going to be called first.
When the host announced, “On deck, Poetic Rose,” we all swung our heads and stared at Kari. The crowd cheered and snapped their fingers as she recited her poem “Sweet Tooth Sally.”
“I felt like I had just performed at the Apollo,” Kari said. “It was exhilarating, and I loved the crowd’s reaction afterwards.”
When Kari got off stage, we were all motivated to compete. A couple more poets were called up before we heard, “On deck, Joyful Demon.” The crowd started to laugh during Justyn’s poem, “Recycle Bin,” so he went with it.
“It was really scary, going up in front of so many good poets,” Justyn said.
Once Justyn was finished, Chyna looked at me and nodded her head. We were the only two in the poetry club left to compete. A few more poets went up before it was announced that Chyna was on deck. She began to get nervous, but the poetry club helped calm her down. She performed her poem “Something.”
“At first, I thought I did really bad, but the poetry club reassured me that I did good,” Chyna said.
Many poets went up before it was announced that there were fewer than five poets remaining. I didn’t want to be last. Luckily, I wasn’t. I nervously read my poem “Ana’s Grip.” When I got off stage, I felt accomplished because I was able to overcome my stagefright.
After the last few poets finished, a few guests read their poems while the judges tallied the scores. Kari and Justyn made it through to the semi-finals. Though they weren’t as successful during their second trip to the Nuyorican, they still felt accomplished.
“I felt like I could’ve done better, but the crowd was going crazy so I felt perfectly fine,” Kari said.
Even though he didn’t make it to the finals, Justyn said performing at the Nuyorican the second time “was a lot more comfortable.”
The members of the poetry club faced each other at it’s fifth annual poetry slam at the West Side Theater on June 4. After 2 exciting rounds of slamming, Kari won.
