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Open Mic Highlights
• Bailey and Artemis led off the open mic with love poems to each other, warming everyone’s hearts and inciting the ire of our apparently anti-love host Myles Taylor (full disclosure: they met before coming to the Cantab)
• “My sister’s pain is empty eggshells” – Edie writing into Amy’s “Locket” poem
• Abe’s “This Stream of Conscious Isn’t Over” and the surprising appearance of a demiquaver in Nick Roberts’ poem
• Kaitie D’s “Patient History” poem, part of a lineage of BPS poems written after visiting an OB/GYN (“Every question I answer is an iceberg”)
• “After weeks of rain I returned to the persimmon tree” – first-timer Remo
• Normally a group piece contrapuntal (by Jade, Edie, and Abe) would be a stand-out piece at an open mic, but here at BPS, contrapuntals are just the NORM, and EXPECTED. Thanks Jade!
• “Have you seen a thing rising from the east? It’s a thing called hope” – Sahfa’s haiku
• Bobby’s color translation poem about how different languages see and think about color, and why goldfish in French translates to “Red Fish”
• Briana’s sexy piece, “Jazz bit your lip from sunset”
• Kai and yours truly did a found poem / group piece reading all the messages Kaitie D has sent us on venmo the past couple of years
• “My inner child has never stopped working” / “I’m good at school because I’m good at answering my questions” – Amy
Feature
Michael Lee graced the stage this week with many friends and fans in the audience! While he did treat us to an older memorized slam piece about addiction and some poems from his 2019 book The Only Worlds We Know, things really kicked into gear for both audience and poet when he started reading some fiery new work, including his experience at the 2020 Minneapolis uprising, and current-day violence in Minnesota. Two litanies stuck out with their repetition and their power, one revolving around the phrase “The pen is mightier than the sword” and the other based of the line “What kind of god should we ask to stop all this”. Other memorable bits: “I’ve been wanting to see this police station burn and now I’m finally seeing it”, “If you don’t like [sobriety] after 6 months, you can have all your pain and misery back”, “Dust is grief in its final form”. Thanks Michael!
Coming Up This Wednesday
OUR NEXT TEAM SELECTION PRELIM IS HERE! The second half of our qualified poet pool will be battling for placement in Team Selection Finals. Top four poets move on! The open mic will be shortened again to accommodate the longer show, so please get here early!
This prelim will feature the following poets:
Mary S
Logan Lopez
Winston Liao
Jarvis Subia
Kelsey Kessler
Mugs Myers
Aparna Paul
Ember Bricault
See you there!
– MFG 🚪
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