BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! Goes to NewActon!

The Score Adder, Me, CJ bowerbird and The Flying V.
Image courtesy of Adam Thomas

THE INVITATION TO THE FINAL OF THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY HEAT OF THE AUSTRALIAN POETRY SLAM IS NOW UPON YOU AS BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! GOES TO NEWACTON!

Drawn from competitions held by BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! across the intersections of Civic and the outer north of Canberra’s inner northern streets we bring you fourteen finalists who will take to the stage under the eaves of all the apartments and hotel rooms built around NewActon to do further battle for the second most coveted trophy of poetry in THE CANBERRA!

YES POETRY AND TROPHY AND THE CANBERRA*

That second most coveted trophy being conceptual and being the right to represent the Australian Capital Territory at the Australian Poetry Slam Final in Sydney!

The MOST coveted trophy of poetry of course being one of the broken action figures provided by Impact Comics which we give to First Prize Winners at BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! at The Phoenix Pub.*

BUT YES THAT IS ALL CORRECT!

THIS IS THE ACT FINAL FOR POETRY!

And when that is all capitalised it can be a bit confusing so here it is with full stops:

THIS IS THE A.C.T. FINAL FOR POETRY!

Bela Farkas
Image courtesy of Adam Thomas

 Still, even without action figures the first prize of going to Sydney to battle it out at their Australian Poetry Slam campfire jamboree for further prizes, such as going to China to the Bookworm Festival and Indonesia to the Ubud Festival and to Sydney again but this next time it being for the Sydney Writers Festival is all pretty sweet. YES PRETTY SWEET! WHEN YOU WIN YOU GET TO GO TO THESE THINGS AS A WINNER, not like the rest of the attendees…

“WHO ARE OUR FINALISTS?”

I HEAR YOU SCREAMING AT SCREENS ACROSS THE TERRITORY AND INTERSTATE AND IN THE FAR FLUNG OLD AND NEW WORLDS!

They in no particular order are:

CMC, Eleanor, Aaron, Isaac, Aiden, Melea, Pete, Azim, Duncan, Fenella, Bernadette, Callum, CJ Bowerbird, John, Gabriella, and Erica… [names may change as contestants correct BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT!’s spelling and/or provide a pseudonym and/or stage-name and/or a real name].

Calum and Erica
Image courtesy of Adam Thomas

 For those who can count — yes! there are sixteen names above, BUT TWO DON’T CARE FOR OUR EFFORTS AT VALIDATION THROUGH PUTTING THEM IN FINALS! (or something like that) and have ridden off into the red dawn to seek truth amongst rhyming Cuban paratroopers who wear berets and keffiyehs if that is how you pluralise it or something like that.

So join us at NewActon for poetry, and by us I mean The Master of Conflict who hates poetry but loves poets, Local Yeller Andrew Galan who YELLS, The Score Adder who makes it all work, and our Sacrificial Poet who will be put to the chopper to open proceedings EVEN THOUGH HE DOES NOT RHYME!

All for BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT!

All for you!

All with FIRST PRIZES from IMPACT COMICS** and THE GAMES CAPITAL** and the NewActon**** and a BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! BACK SHED!***

Remember those rulie rules that can be found here (http://australianpoetryslam.com/rules) how anyone is going to police one or two recognizable pop culture references is beyond BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! SO JUST FLAP YOUR ARMS AND DON’T MENTION JAR JAR BINKS MORE THAN TWICE, OR DO BUT DO NOT ALSO MENTION JULIUS CAESAR AND A KARDASHIAN AND NAPOLEAN AND BILL AND/OR TED ALL IN THE ONE POEM – "naughty, naughty" we will be forced to say!

Or something like that…

The audience at Smiths Alternative Bookshop
Image courtesy of Adam Thomas

 See you at “BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! Goes to NewActon!”

*[In a voice-over voice] Prize may or may not include some form of trophy.

** [In a voice-over voice] Prize guaranteed to be not broken and still definitely awesome at the same time.

*** [In a voice-over voice] Prize not guaranteed to be not broken and still not definitely awesome at the same time.

**** [In a voice-over voice] Prize may include a flight or bus-ride or old pair of volleys to get you to Sydney.

The Nov. Poetry Slam Poster

BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT!

Bone Orchard Poetry

Bone Orchard Poetry published two of my poems earlier this month, Clockwork and Nagasaki Sunset.

A tree in Hawaii

If you follow the above link to read the poems then also check out three poems by Kyle Hemmings at the same blogzine.

BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! 7:30pm on 17 October 2012 @ The Phoenix Pub

THE THIRD HEAT OF THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY AUSTRALIAN POETRY SLAM!

All for you!

Back in the Phoenix Pub!

And dedicated to marsupials!

Which means we want your words on the BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! stage!

BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! is your monthly poetry slam in Canberra that provides you with two minutes, (why won’t they think of the marsupials?), an audience, A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT, two microphones, THE SCORE ADDER, judges – five judges!, (...the marsupials...) more first prizes than ever or ever will be, THE MASTER OF CONFLICT, another MC, A STAGE, The Sacrificial Poet, THE OPPORTUNITY TO LISTEN TO POETRY or not, and the chance to perform whatever words you’ve got.

DON’T FORGET THE MARSUPIALS!

There are some special rules for this heat as it is part of the Australian Poetry Slam. They are here: http://australianpoetryslam.com/rules.

Oh for the love of marsupials...

WE HAVE FEATURE ACTS!

And they are:

PAUL MAGEE

"Paul Magee is the author of the surrealist ethnography From Here to Tierra del Fuego (University of Illinois Press: 2000) and Cube Root of Book (John Leonard Press: 2006), which is in verse. He is working on Chapter Twelve, again for John Leonard Press. Paul teaches poetry at the University of Canberra, where he is an Associate Professor. He has published extensively on psychoanalysis, stagnation, boredom and revolution."

AND:

JULIA JOHNSON

"Julia Johnson is the frontwoman of Julia and the Deep Sea Sirens. She has been compared to Sarah Blasko and Joni Mitchell, but she has also been compared to Joan Rivers and The Little Mermaid. You might hate her because she likes poems that rhyme, but she promises not to perform one. She knows all the words to Gangster's Paradise, and won the Triple J Unearthed Songwriting Comp earlier this year."

So bring your words ‘cause we want them on stage because BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! is a poetry slam full of marsupials.

And remember, no props, original material, no music, your words, on stage, 2 minutes, at The Phoenix Pub.

MARSUPIALS ARE NOT A THEME!

BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT!

(This heat sponsored by IMPACTCOMICS, The Games Capital, The RiotACT, NewActon, and a BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! back shed.)

BRISBANE POETRY

From late-August into early-September I spent just over two weeks in Brisbane.

While there I featured at SpeedPoets and the Jam Jar Poetry Slam. I also took part in two events at the Queensland Poetry Festival: a workshop run by L. E. Scott, and a poetry slam run by Scott Sneddon. And I got to assist Ghostboy in his MCing of the Page vs. Stage poetry slam at the Brisbane Writers Festival where I was also the sacrificial poet.

The poetry workshop

L. E. Scott’s poetry workshop was jazz poetry; it didn’t involve studying, writing and/or workshopping jazz poetry. No we flowed with the workshop, interjected and interrupted or were confused, and we all performed at least one poem during the few hours we had.

The core of the workshop was L. E. Scott’s improvisational exploration of the writing that accompanied the African-American Civil Rights Movement, and he clearly often lost himself there. But, when I got past his calling it “the Black Arts” and me imagining cackling witches around a cauldron, the workshop gave insight into a poetry movement I had not considered and led to writers I had not previously known.  

While I think at times the workshop struggled to come to grips with his method and language, all the participants shaped the workshop through verse, questions, and puzzlement.

“VI

The poetry of life?

NO, the picture of my dreams

Flashing on my heart.”

- Lewis Grandison Alexander

SpeedPoets

I featured at SpeedPoets with Trudie Murrell. Set at the deepest end of Brew in Brisbane’s Central Business District the SpeedPoets venue is a great spot for poetry.

This performance meant a lot to me: 1) I was performing to strangers in a strange city; 2) Graham Nunn, who runs the gig, is an accomplished poet with many publications, books, and performances; and 3) he is close friends with one of the poets who inspired me to perform, David Stavanger aka Ghostboy.

And I got to hang out with Hadley who stole about two-thirds of the cider I thought I was drinking over the afternoon and evening.

SpeedPoets has a full open mic that gives a piece of Brisbane’s poetry, and the website and monthly associated publication that Graham produces for it contain a great many poems to read. As part of being features Trudie and I decided who would be the call back poet, that poet has the opportunity to perform more poems on the night, plus go into a final competition at the end of the year. We decided on Cameron Logan, his poem IPSWICH grabbed the entire room. I have seen Cameron perform often in Queensland and always enjoyed his work.

Jam Jar Poetry Slam

I could say this is the other end of the poetry spectrum in Brisbane, but it isn’t and that is a cliché. Jam Jar Poetry Slam is another piece of Brisbane poetry, this one run by Darkwing Dubs, also known as Scott Sneddon. Darkwing Dubs, side-by-side with Hadley, is one of the best poets I know to have gone to the Australian National Poetry Slam in Sydney and prove the saying that “the best poet never wins.”

So Darkwing Dubs running it is part of what makes this slam special to me. The other is that I reckon, as with Bad!Slam!No!Biscuit!, it belongs firmly in the Genus Poetry Slam due to a basis in what “So What!” should mean to a poetry slam. To me this is the most important rule of a poetry slam because a poetry slam is just “a performance space, literally a demarcated and dedicated chunk of space/time" where you can’t have too much fun.

A lot of poetry was performed, two rounds starting with twelve poets, and I really enjoyed the poem and performance of Tim Lo Surdo.

Featuring here meant a lot and I lost myself in the gig, as I did at SpeedPoets, and came out of the performance haze at dinner about an hour later. The slam runs without a mic which I found gave me the same freedom as walking the streets of Canberra memorising poems. Hopefully I thanked Scott and said goodbye. If I didn’t then it was because I was somewhere else after that performance and it was a good place.

Page vs. Stage poetry slam

Page versus stage is an engaging concept, and getting to take part in haranguing judges in the crowd about what they made of a poem was great. My favourite judge, the two-headed judge, stated content didn’t matter, they said it is all in the delivery and who cares what the poem is about. I performed The Dark Horse of Poetry as the sacrificial poem and the personal high point of this night was getting to help Ghostboy run a slam.

Thank you to everyone in Brisbane who made the trip a poetry and food filled expedition, particularly Harry, Hadley, and Tessa.

When I was in Queensland
I got this photo for you.

The Violent

I have two poems forthcoming with Bone Orchard Poetry.

Published out of Ireland the blogzine describes itself as explorative of the Bleak/ the Surreal/ the Dark/ Absurd and the Experimental.

Bone Orchard Poetry

Since January Bone Orchard Poetry has published several Howie Good poems, if you only read one then make it HARBINGERS. Howie Good is one of my favourite poets. What I find within his work are the writings of the static tension moments within violence.

Kyle Hemmings is the newest poet I have found to read. He too has several poems with the Blogzine. For me Post-Op has echoes of Ballard’s Crash. I first read his work over at the South Townsville micro poetry journal where he has a poem titled In the Junkyards.

The ACT Australian Poetry Slam Heat Number Two - The Hadley Memorial Slam

THE PRESENT CRISIS CALLS FOR HEAT NUMBER TWO OF THE ACT AUSTRALIAN POETRY SLAM HEATS!

This time at Smiths Alternative Bookstore/shop/frontage/wine bar/cafe...

With words, bring your words, and your renga, and your haiku, or your tanka, and your hokku, or even your renku, ‘cause it’s a crisis time I tellsya, crisis, and only poetry can save us if we wave our arms to the sky and say WORD! or

Yes, word.

And no you don’t have to restrict yourself to the above list of poetry forms, really, we will take anything.

But there are special rules for this poetry slam heat, find those rules by following the next link on this page, because preparation is your Uncle, as they say, and your Uncle is Mad: Australian Poetry Slam!

Now no poetry night would be complete without a feature act.

And our feature act for this evening is the all kinds of wonderfully special Drew Walky!

Drew Walky’s music has been described as “original and lyrically rich, with a folk-psychedelic edge” and “personal puzzles…delivered in an alternative folk style with a very ‘hippy hippy shake’ flavour.”

Read more about Drew Walky here: BMA Magazine on Drew Walky and then listen to him live at Smiths Alternative Bookshop on Saturday night.

CRISIS ALMOST RESOLVED!

In the invite for Heat One we mentioned the MASTER OF CONFLICT. The Master of Conflict was unfortunately turned into a vampire that night so who KNOWS IF HE WILL MAKE IT TO THIS SLAM, but clap and hope he is going to be there for us is all we can say and do, CLAP IS ALL THAT CAN SAVE HIM, CLAP! You may just bring him back from the dead, or as the undead. And you do want him there, 'cause he brings prizes, YES PRIZES!

CLAP, CRISIS!

And then, as written earlier, bring yourself and your POETRY SPRUIKING GUNDAM to Smiths Alternative Bookshop for poetry, and prizes, and glory.

CRISIS NOT RESOLVED!

CLAP!

Thanks to our sponsors IMPACT COMICS, THE GAMES CAPITAL, THE PHOENIX PUB, THE RIOTACT and NEWACTON.

And remember, there is one more heat after this, it is on 17 October at The Phoenix Pub and it shall be known as Heat Number Three, and then there is the final at NewActon on 3 November, it shall be known as…

The Final

Remember, crisis… clap...

The ACT Australian Poetry Slam events are brought to you by:

BAD!SLAM!NO!BISCUIT! which can normally be found in The Phoenix Pub on the third Wednesday of every month!