Slam Poetry

The The Impotence of Proofreading - Taylor Mali

First off, it gets very inappropriate at the end, so if you wish to retain virgin ears, I advise you to not listen to the last minute.

Slam Poetry is associated with spoken word and the poems are not available in text online. It is quite odd. But, with a Slam poem it is always easier to understand the true meaning of the poem because the tone and mood are readily provided.

I do not know the background to this poem, but I thought it would be refreshing to practice our proofreading skills that Ms. Giggie always tells us about.

Marc Smith started the rejuvenation of Slam Poetry in 1986 and now the home of Slam Poetry is in the state of New York. For almost a century, poetry began to decline as an art and wasn't considered a branch of literature. With slam poetry, the rebirth of poetry can be seen everywhere. Today, many skits and raps are all slam poetry. The audience is always the judge and they are critiqued based on their performances. Poetry truly is a performing art.

The topic is always important in Slam Poetry, and the interesting topic of the "impotence of proofreading" is quite interesting. All the Slam Poems I have seen are all satirical or mocking of a certain group. In this poem, Mali picks on student ambitions and their inability to comprehend the true magnitude of education. Student's are always one step ahead, but never complete the task at hand. In reality, Mali is criticizing our society, or the society we are becoming. We believe that we can reach great heights with minimal effort. Mali uses many caesuras to display the incompetence of student's to the greatest degree. Along with caesura, emjambment is used to show the thought process of our society. Together, we stop and think about whats at task, and we break everything up and see if we can do the bare minimum to achieve the absolute maximum.

This theme is carried throughout the poem. Slam poetry, I believe is the back bone of poetry. The true meaning of poetry can be seen through these slam poets who demostrate such strong conviction in their poems. Also, it is very comical and I actually enjoy listening to it.