Poetry's Still Got It

Last week, one of my friends posted a video on Facebook by a group called YOUTHSPEAKS, an organization that supports slam poetry competitions across the US. I was immediately sucked in to their YouTube page in awe, watching handfuls of videos and wondering how I could have brushed off this powerful style of poetry.

As I sat there, listening to these young people express themselves with such artistry and raw emotion I had to think, where does poetry fit in today's society?

After initially reading an article by Alexandra Petri of the Washington Post, I felt a little disheartened. I appreciated that she defended journalists by saying that people can say what they want about newspapers, but they'll always need news. I was saddened, however, when I read that not only are people not as "good" at poetry as they were in the past, but that nobody is even reading/writing/listening anymore.

So you can imagine my joy when I found this article by Emily Temple on Flavorwire, combating Petri's story with references of recently published poems that are in no way fading out of the spotlight. Like ballet and opera, Temple says, art forms are not dead simply because they are enjoyed by a minority.

It gives me hope for print journalism, that traditional newspapers and books will always hold a little place in people's hearts...

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Here's my favorite slam poetry video I watched from YOUTHSPEAKS, which is eerily appropriate for today...

"Starburst" by Jude Marx and Emily Bjustrom