Controversy (and Poetry) Reign as Mouth Almighty Wins National Slam. . . Da Boogey Man Becomes First Male Slam Champ
Dateline: 8/12/97Middletown, CT: In a series of poetry slams marked by official protests and concluding with boos mixed with thunderous applause, Mouth Almighty came back from a semifinal defeat to Chicago to win the 8th National Poetry Slam team competition held in the huge Freeman Auditorium Saturday, August 9 before 900 screaming poetry lovers. The scores of the Finals looked like this: Mouth Almighty 115, Chicago 110, Cleveland 109.8, Worcester 105.85.
The two protests were both lodged against Mouth Almighty, a team of New York City all-stars; both were disallowed. They pointed, however, to a deep concern in the Slam Family about corporate sponsorship (Mouth Almighty is the world's first major poetry label), as well as to the all-star nature of the team: Regie Cabico, Evert Eden, Taylor Mali & Beau Sia, with Bob Holman as coach. “This begins the era of the Super Team!” shouted an ecstatic Cabico, whose coming-out-to-Mom poem, performed as a duet with Mali, was the evening’s final and highest scoring poem.
In the Individual Slam, Da Boogey Man, stalwart of the Cleveland team which was undefeated going into the Finals, read two powerful, slow-paced poems which resonated strongly in the air hangar fieldhouse. Patricia Smith, host for the Individual Finals with Slam Founder Marc Smith, announced that this was the first time in the history of Slam that a man had won the prize. DJ Renegade of Washington, DC finished second for the third year in a row, with Glenis Redmond-Sherer of Greenville, NC taking third.
--Bob Holman
This is the poem Taylor Mali read in the first round of the National Slam Finals, the poem that gave Mouth Almighty a 3-point lead that was never headed:
Like Lilly Like Wilson
by Taylor Mali
I'm writing the poem that will change the world,
and it's Lilly Wilson at my office door.
Lilly Wilson, the recovering like addict,
the worst I've ever seen.
So bad the whole eighth grade
started calling her Like Lilly Like Wilson.
'Till I declared my class a Like-Free Zone
and she could not speak for days.
But when she finally did, it was to say,
Mr. Mali, this is . . . so hard.
Now I have to . . . think before I . . . say anything.
Imagine that, Lilly.
It's for your own good.
Even if you don't like . . .
it.
I'm writing the poem that will change the world,
and it's Lilly Wilson at my office door.
Lilly is writing a research paper for me about how gays
like shouldn't be allowed to adopt children.
I'm writing the poem that will change the world,
and it's Like Lilly Like Wilson at my office door.
Lilly's having trouble finding sources,
which is to say, ones that back her up:
They all argue in favor of what I thought I was against.
And it took all four years of college,
three years of graduate school,
and every incidental teaching experience I have ever had
to let out only,
That's a real interesting problem, Lilly.
But what do you propose to do about it?
That's what I want to know.
And the eighth-grade mind is a beautiful thing;
Like a new-born baby's face, you can often see it
change before your very eyes.
I can't believe I'm saying this, Mr. Mali,
but I think I'd like to switch sides.
And I want to tell her to do more than just believe it,
but to enjoy it! That changing your mind is one of the best ways
of finding out whether you still have one.
Or even that minds are like parachutes,
that it doesn't so much matter what you pack them with
so long as they open
at the right time.
I want to say all this but manage only,
Lilly, I am like so impressed with you.
So I finally taught someone something,
namely, how to change your mind.
And learned in the process that if I ever change the world
it's going to be one eighth grader at a time.
