[ Music ]
>> Poetry and Prose is sponsored
by the National Endowment
for the Arts.
>> Hi. I'm Mary Anne Carter,
Chairman of the National
Endowment for the Arts.
For 15 years the National
Endowment for the Arts along
with our partner, The
Poetry Foundation,
have celebrated the
power of words
by hosting Poetry Out Loud.
Poetry Out Loud is a
recitation competition open
to high school students
nationwide.
Poetry Out Loud is a program
that helps high school students
discover and explore poetry ,
ome of the poems
written hundreds
of years before they
were born and others
by contemporary poets.
And here is Adrian Matejka,
a former Literature Fellow,
a 2014 Pulitzer Prize
nominee for poetry
and a former Poetry
Out Loud judge.
>> One of the things
that Poetry Out Loud
as a program does is create
a really inclusive space.
So if you are a student
who maybe isn't familiar
with poetry, you come in
and you have the opportunity
to read poets of different
cultural communities,
different economic circumstances
and to really inhabit
those words.
>> Poetry Out Loud helps
students understand the power
of words and gives them an
opportunity to find their voice.
Each year, our Poetry Out Loud
champions share their voice
at the National Book Festival.
Last year, our national champion
and runner-up joined
Jericho Brown,
a former Literature Fellow and
the 2020 Pulitzer Prize winner
for poetry on stage
at the festival.
>> My name is Jericho Brown,
and I'm going to start
by introducing to you the --
to the 2019 second place
winner who is quite amazing.
I was a judge for this
particular competition this
year, and when I saw her I
remember sitting in the audience
and just crying tears.
And so I have huge expectations
of your emotions today.
So, ladies and gentlemen,
without further ado,
Scottlynn Ballard.
>> I will be reciting
Self-Help By Michael Ryan.
What kind of delusion
are you under?
The life he hid just
knocked you flat.
You see the lightning
but not the thunder.
What God hath joined
let no man put asunder.
Did God know you'd marry a rat?
What kind of delusion
are you under?
His online persona simply
stunned her, as it did you
when you started to chat.
What kind of delusion
are you under?
To the victors go the plunder.
You should crown them
with a baseball bat.
What kind of delusion
are you under?
The kind that causes
blunder after blunder.
Is there any other
kind than that?
You see the lightning
but not the thunder,
and for one second
the world's a wonder.
Just keep it thrilling
under your hat.
What kind of delusion
are you under?
You see the lightning
but not the thunder.
[ Applause ]
>> I told you.
And now for our first place
winner Isabella Callery,
who's here all the
way from Minnesota.
Let's give Isabella
Callery a hand.
[ Applause ]
>> Abecedarian Requiring
Further Examination
of Anglikan Seraphym Subjugation
of a Wild Indian
Rezervation by Natalie Diaz.
Angels don't come
to the reservation.
Bats, maybe, or owls,
boxy mottled things.
Coyotes, too.
They all mean the
same thing: Death.
And death eats angels, I guess,
because I haven't seen an angel
fly through this valley ever.
Gabriel? Never heard of him.
Know a guy named Gabe, though.
He came through here one powwow
and stayed, typical Indian.
Sure he had wings,
jailbird that he was.
He flies around in stolen cars.
Wherever he stops, kids grow
like gourds from
women's bellies.
Like I said, no Indian
I've ever heard
of has ever been
or seen an angel.
Maybe in a Christmas
pageant or something.
Nazarene Church holds
one every December,
organized by Pastor John's wife.
It's no wonder Pastor
John's son is the angel.
Everyone knows angels are white.
Quit bothering with
angels, I say.
They're no good for Indians.
Remember what happened last time
some white God came floating
across the ocean?
Truth is, there may be angels.
But if there are angels
Up there, living on clouds
or sitting on thrones across
the sea wearing velvet robes
and golden rings, drinking
whiskey from silver cups,
we're better off if they
stay rich and fat and ugly
and exactly where they are,
in their own distant heaven.
You better hope you never
see angels on the rez.
If you do, they'll be marching
you off to Zion or Oklahoma,
or some other hell
they've mapped out for us.
>> Okay. So I want to ask
just about those two poems.
What was the process
that you went
through to learn those poems.
And, before that, I'd like
to know how did you come
about those poems?
How did you come to, how did
you find those particular poems?
And why did you choose to
learn and recite those poems?
Can y'all tell me those, the
story of those poems for you?
>> Okay.
>> Yeah. I mean, for
me, I really wanted
to look for a Native poet.
And when I found that poem by
Natalie Diaz, it really hit home
with me on a lot of things.
So I knew I wanted
to do that one.
And then my process
of memorizing is just
taking it line by line.
Memorizing has -- is
kind of easy for me,
as weird as that sounds.
I like to memorize things.
But the real fun of
it for me is sitting
and analyzing it line by line.
What words do I want
to emphasize?
Where do I want my
gestures to be.
And that's what I had
the most fun with.
>> Mine was not that
complicated.
I found Self-Help
because when I read it,
it was sort of in your face
in the sense that it was sort
of addressing the reader --
well, reader, poet,
whatever personally.
And I kind of liked it because
it was sort of my excuse
to be sassy at someone
without being sassy at someone.
And when I found that poem,
thanks to Miss Haskins,
my Honors Junior
American Lit teacher,
I started to annotate that poem.
Like, I printed that poem
out at least three times.
And every single time
there were other, like,
so many things I
wrote on the paper,
like what does this
line mean to me?
How can I apply that to
my own personal life?
What red does that line do for
me, and how can I emphasize it
in a way that both addresses
my feelings toward the audience
and the audience
understanding them.
>> Well, the National
Championship for Poetry
Out Loud had to be cancelled
this year due to the pandemic.
We still had more than
260,000 high school students
participate nationwide.
Here we're pleased to
share videos of several
of our state champions.
You can find these and
many more at arts.gov.
>> Rondeau by Leigh Hunt.
Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she
sat in; Time, you thief,
who love to get Sweets into
your list, put that in:
Say I'm weary, say I'm
sad, Say that health
and wealth have missed
me, Say I'm growing old,
but add, Jenny kissed me.
>> It would be Neat if with the
New Year by Jimmy Santiago Baca.
For Miguel.
It would be neat if with the New
Year I could leave my loneliness
behind with the old year, my
leathery loneliness an old pair
of work boots my dog
vigorously head shakes back
and forth in its jaws.
She was on for hours every
day in the front yard,
rain, sun, snow or wind.
And bare feet, pondering my
poem, I'd look out my window
and see those dirty pair
of boots in the yard.
But my happiness depends so
much on wearing those boots.
At the end of my day, while
I'm in a chair listening
to a Mexican corrido,
I stare at my boots,
appreciating all the wrong
roads we've taken, all the drug
and whiskey houses we visited.
And as the Mexican singer wails
his pain, I smile at my boots,
understanding every
note in his voice.
And strangers, when they see
my boots rocking back and forth
on my feet, keeping
the beat to the song,
see how my boots are scuffed,
tooth marked, worn soled.
I keep wearing them
because they fit so good.
And I need them, especially
when I love so hard.
Where I go up those
boulder-strewn trails
where flowers crack rocks
in their defiant
love for the light.
>> I'm Listening to Your
Teacher Take Attendance
by Aimee Nezhukumatathil.
Breathe deep, even if it
means you wrinkle your nose
from the fake lemon antiseptic
of the mopped floors and wiped
down doorknobs, the freshly
soaked necks and armpits.
Your teacher means well,
even if he butchers your name
like he has a bloody sausage
casing stuck between his teeth,
handprints on his
white sloppy apron.
And when everyone turns
around to check out your face,
no need to flush red and warm.
Just picture all the eyes
as if your classroom
is one big scallop
with its dozens of icy blues.
And you will remember that
winter your family took you
to the China Sea, and you
sank your face in it to gaze
at baby clams and sea stars the
size of your outstretched hand.
And when all those
necks start to crane,
try not to forget someone
once lathered their bodies,
once patted them dry with a
fluffy towel after a bath,
set out their clothes for
the first day of school.
Think of their pencil
cases from third grade,
full of sharp pencils,
a pink pearl eraser.
Think of their handheld pencil
sharpener and its tiny blade.
>> The Mortician in San
Francisco by Randall Mann.
This may sound queer,
but in 1985 I held the
delicate hands of Dan White.
I prepared him for burial.
By then, Harvey Milk
was made monument.
No, myth by the years
since he was shot.
I remember when Harvey was shot,
20; and I knew I was queer.
Those were the years, Levi's and
leather jackets, holding hands
on Castro Street,
cheering for Harvey Milk,
elected on the same
day as Dan White.
I often wonder about
Supervisor White
who fatally shot Mayor
Mostone and Supervisor Milk,
who was one of us,
a Castro queer.
May 21, 1979, a jury hands
down the sentence: Seven years,
in truth, five years for
ex-cop, ex-fireman Dan White
for the blood on his
hands when he confessed
that he had shot the
Mayor and the queer.
A few men in blue
cheered, and Harvey Milk,
why cry over spilled
milk, some wondered.
Semi-privately for years
it meant one less queer.
The jurors turned to White.
If just the Mayor had been shot,
Dan might have had
trouble on his hands.
But the twelve who held his life
in their hands maybe didn't
mind the death of Harvey Milk;
maybe the second murder
offered him a shot
at serving only a few years.
In the end, he committed
suicide, this Dan White.
And he was made presentable
by a queer.
>> Because it has
no pure products,
because the Pacific Ocean
sweeps along the coastline,
because the water
of the ocean is cold
and because land is better than
ocean, because I say we rather
than they, because I live
in California I have eaten fresh
artichokes and jacaranda bloom
in April and May because
my senses have caught
up with my body; my breath with
the air it swallows my hunger
with my mouth, because I
walk barefoot in my house,
because I have nursed
my son at my breast
because he is a strong
American boy,
because I have seen his
eyes redden when he is asked
who he is because he
answers I don't know
because to have a son
is to have a country
because my son will bury me
here because countries are
in our blood and we bleed them
because it is late and too late
to change my mind
because it is time.
>> We hope high school students
nationwide will participate
in the Poetry Out Loud program
during the 20-21 school year.