Poetry Center San José presents San José Poetry Slam Zoom Edition!

Come join us for Poetry from the comfort of your own home.

Sunday June 12th.

Room opens at 6:30 pm (California time).

Sign up list will be open from 6:30 to 7pm.

Slam starts at 7.

We are on Pacific Standard time, that is 3 hours earlier than east coast time and 3 hours ahead of Hawaii.

This is a free event.

Hosted by Scorpiana Xlent!

Cash prizes for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place.

If you have never been to a Poetry Slam before, a poetry slam is a competition, imagine spoken word poetry as an Olympic sport. The rules are simple: 1) Poets must use their own poems. 2) poet must use only one poem per round. 3) no musical accompaniment. 4)no props. 5) there is a time limit of 3 minutes and 10 seconds; going over that will result in a time penalty.

This is a two round slam, poets with the highest scores will move up to round two.

You can sign up to compete via the chatbox in the zoom room.

If you're not competing, we could use judges.

Michael Jasso (not to be confused for your dad) is a poet, teaching artist and organizer based out of California's Central Valley. He is the founder of The Loud Mouth Poetry Jam, Visalia's premiere slam venue for 8+ years. Since he started competing 11 years ago he's represented his venue at NPS 2014 & 2015, competed as a storm poet at IWPS 2018, and has coached several of Visalia's reps. Much like your dad, he tells cringey jokes, loves grilling, and asks if your oil has been changed as his form of "I love you."

Poetry Center San José promotes and supports the literary arts in San José. Over the past four decades, PCSJ has brought hundreds of exceptional writers from around the country to read from their works and, in many cases, to conduct workshops for local writers. PCSJ is a nonprofit organization established in 1978. Its base of operations is in the charming turn-of-the-century Victorian home where the renown poet Edwin Markham once lived, now located in San Jose History Park. Since the Fall of 2000, PCSJ has sponsored a series of readings by local poets throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Poetry Center San José is a member supported organization and is funded, in part, by grants from Applied Materials Foundation, the City of San Jose's Office of Cultural Affairs, Knight Foundation, Poets & Writers, Silicon Valley Community Foundation, Silicon Valley Creates, in partnership with the County of Santa Clara and the California Arts Council and generous giving from Anne & Mark's Art Party and Brandenburg Family Foundation.