www.traversepoetry.org

I’ve just sent out the first issue of my ACT slam e-news for 2009 with a brief run down of the first few months’ events.

If you’d like to receive a copy of the e-newsletter just send a quick email to poetry.slams@gmail.com

Meanwhile, here is the awesome poster I mention in the newsletter, produced by Andrew Darragh (She Loves Me zine):

The full-size image is available, as is an A4 PDF if you’d like to print and distribute (feel free!).

Traverse Poetry is kicking off 2009 with a huge poetry slam in Queanbeyan!

The first Traverse slam for 2009 will take place on the opening night of the Benedict House art:house festival – so, as well as the usual open mic and slam competition (with cash prizes!), there will also be a huge range of artwork to view and buy, including paintings, drawings, 3D artworks and photography.

Plus the wonderful Julia of the Deep Sea Sirens fame will be serenading us with delightful music!

Queanbeyan Poetry Slam
Benedict House
39 Isabella Street
Queanbeyan

23 January 2009
7.30-11.30pm – book your spot in the slam at 7.30pm.
$3 entry / free for performers (all proceeds go to Julia and the slam winners).

Check out who’s going to be there on Facebook.

I’m going to be a bit unconventional and post about 2009 Traverse events out of chronological order – as you can see from the events page, there are a couple of activities planned for next year before the exciting Canberra Zine Fair. I’m doing this because I want to give people as much lead time as possible to get cracking on their zines.

Here are the details:

Canberra Zine Fair as part of SCRIBBLE: young writers, young readers festival
7 February 2009
Q2 Foyer
Gorman House Arts Centre
Ainslie Avenue, Braddon

Times are unconfirmed at the moment, but it’s most likely they’ll be like this year’s – i.e. doors open 9.30am and it wraps up in the early evening.

It’s entirely free to come a sell/trade your work (and we’re encouraging not just zinesters to be there – anyone who’s into self-publishing, DIY and etsy are welcome) but if you don’t have your own table the ACT Writers Centre are renting trestle tables at $10 per table (fits three people comfortably), payable on the day. Chairs will be free and plentiful.

Please send me a quick email if you’d like to book a spot!

There’s also a facebook event if you want to check out who’s going to be there (or at least claiming to be).

You can now view videos of the winners from the ACT Australian Poetry Slam heats performing their poems in exotic Canberra locations… watch and find out how each of them answers tricky questions such as ‘What will you do if you win?’

1. Adam Hadley*
2. Omar Musa
3. David Finnigan**/***

*Featuring best ever unplanned interruption EVER!
**Thanks for the name check!
***What’s with cranking up the bass when you’re talking about what happens when stuff goes wrong – it’s a damned conspiracy!

I am bitterly, bitterly disappointed that I won’t be going up to watch these fine lads duke it out with the other Australian Slam winners. I just didn’t get my act together in time, and now I’m swamped… speaking of which, check back very soon for exciting announcements for 2009!

My word, what an action-packed final it was!

At the end of an incredibly tense slam, Omar Musa (last year’s ACT winner, and grand final runner up) and David Finnigan (whose extreme creativity constantly blows me away) drew for first place and then, after each poet performed a second piece, drew for a second time. So there will be three poets – Hadley, Omar and David – going up to Sydney for the grand final!

Omar’s style was very emotional and down to earth, and less hip hop than last year – his delivery is extremely smooth and a delight to hear. Both of Dave’s pieces were, as too be expected, utterly unexpected. The first, a conversation between David (who writes poetry) and David (who gets the credit) and the second, a passionate yet scientific description of how planets and moons are formed.

As I predicted we had a packed final night and a third of the 20 performers were people I’d never seen perform at previous slams. I tried to get around and talk to all of these poets after the competition and most people seemed interested in coming along to slams at The Front. Unfortunately the regular ones won’t start again until late January, so I hope they will stay keen over the new year’s break.

Munro, Jules (Casual Projects) and Ben were a perfect accompaniment to the slam… Heidi commented on how much they reminded her of early Whitlams – and Munro is certainly as enternaining performer as Tim. Such a pity we will be loosing them to Melbourne!

The Australian Poetry Slams are always a very different sort of poetry slam to our usual ones at The Front.

I think running two heats has positives and negatives. The positives are twice the chance for people to get up and give slam a shot and double the exposure for Canberra slamming in general. The main negative is spreading the possible number of performances too thinly. Last year the single heat was packed with an incredible amount of energy for such a huge room (the National Library foyer). Friday’s slam was quieter but still a rocking good night. I have a suspicion that next week we’ll get a few people over the 20 we’re permitted.

We were under this time and it was slightly disappointing that five of those who had registered didn’t show up to perform (where were you Tom?!?), but the suggestion of the nice Sound Advice guy of walking around with the wireless mic and persuading people to perform was a good one, and one which got us an enjoyable performance from a bloke named Nemo (no aquatic jokes please).

Human Cannonball Academy (AKA Adam Hadley) took the gold with a delightful comparison between dropping the bombshell of ‘I love you’ and dropping the bombshell of having sold all the paracutes as the plane plummets towards to ground.

The silver medal went to a new slam performer, Susan Carcary (winner of the 2008 NSW Bush Poetry Championships) with a hartfeld cry from a little orphan African boy to be saved from the greedy hands of from Brad and Jolie.

Seung was awesome as always, as was Professor Anarchy who has promised to perform another piece for us next Friday.

The crowd seemed to like my love poem which was heartening since I’d only written it three days before. Will put pen to paper to get another one down for next week.

The Cashews were a delight as always, making great use of the space, although not getting all the attention from the crowd that I think they deserved.

Roughly half of Friday’s performances were from people I’ve never seen before which is also what happened last year – I need to figure out a way I can get this talent to perform as part of the regular slams!

Tomorrow (Friday 7 November) night, on ABC Stateline* (7.30pm).

Of course, all of you will be at the slam at that time so you’ll have to set your VCR or catch the repeat Saturday at noon.

The recording happened on Monday – the reporter was sick so the cameraman filmed Heidi answering questions about the slam then Seung Baek, Dennis Wild (runner up of last year’s ACT heat) and I performed a piece each, twice (with the camera at different angles). We did the filming in the National Library’s bookshop against the lovely stained glass windows and I think it went rather well.

People tell me they’ve seen me on the Stateline promo so I presume I’ll make the final cut for the actual show.

*Whose website is gagging for a re-design.

It’s the busiest time of the year for Canberra slams – aside from the regular monthly gig at The Front, we have two ACT heats for Australian Poetry Slam – Friday 7 November and Friday 14 November.

Don’t forget you need to register a slot in order to perform. It’s free and very painless – just email events@nla.gov.au or phone (02) 6262 1271.

Both heats are happening at the National Library of Australia, with some great musos as supports:

• Friday 7 November @ 7.00pm – The Cashews
• Friday 14 November @ 7.00pm – Munro Melano (from Casual Projects)

Check out the neato flyer (click to get the full-size version):

Hello and welcome to the online home for Traverse Poetry.

Traverse Poetry is a new Canberra project funded by artsACT due to take place in 2009. This blog will contain updates and information about the project as well as details of spoken word events in the ACT, plus miscellaneous musings on writing and poetry.

Planning has already begun on the Traverse Project – so keep your eye on this blog or, better still, subscribe to this blog by RSS and sign up to the ACT Poetry Slam e-Newsletter.