As the Twin Cities’ slam poetry scene rebuilds, BuckSlam — a new organization dedicated to the style of competitive poetry performance — has quickly established itself at the forefront.

Now, as its inaugural season comes to a close, BuckSlam is holding its first Grand Slam Finals, a championship for top local slam poets.

The top prize? $5 — a jackpot compared to the cheeky $1 (a buck! Get it?) awarded to the winner of BuckSlam’s monthly slams.

The finals start at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 3, at the Black Hart of Saint Paul, a soccer bar in the Midway. Competitors have qualified for the event by performing well at those monthly events throughout the past year or so.

The four top performers will nab a spot on the 2024 BuckSlam Poetry Team, which means access to slam poetry workshops, coaching sessions with professionals, a writers’ retreat and the ability to compete at regional and possibly national tournaments.

The Twin Cities have long had a significant presence in slam poetry, which itself only started in its modern form in the mid-1980s, said BuckSlam co-organizer Zach Goldberg. Soapboxing, a team from St. Paul, won the National Poetry Slam two years in a row in 2009 and 2010, other St. Paul poets competed on the world stage, and the influential publisher and media company Button Poetry was founded in Minneapolis the next year.

But the national poetry slam scene collapsed somewhat dramatically in 2018 due to a variety of financial and inclusivity concerns, and subsequent efforts to rebuild local slams were vaporized by Covid-19. The National Poetry Slam, Individual World Poetry Slam, College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational and the local Button Poetry Live slam series have all disappeared in recent years.

So now, new regional slam organizations like BuckSlam and the Midwest Poetry Mash-Up are filling the gap. The Mash-Up, now in its second year, is set to take place in late April at the Strike Theater in Minneapolis and will feature competitors from around the country, plus from Canada and the U.K.

And, by the looks of it, both poets and audience members are excited for the slam resurgence. The March BuckSlam event at Boneshaker Books in Minneapolis was standing-room-only, Goldberg said.

For an organization that’s not even a full year old, BuckSlam’s leaders — a five-member collective of poets and slam organizers — have created what appears to be impressively solid infrastructure.

Every month since May 2023, the organization has held slam competitions at Boneshaker. Anyone can sign up, but there are only 10 or so performance slots during each event, so poets are selected at random, Goldberg said. (For fairness’ sake, if a poet’s name isn’t drawn two months in a row, they’re guaranteed a performance slot the subsequent month.)

The scoring process at BuckSlam events, like at many poetry slams, is also infused with spontaneity. Judges are not necessarily professionals nor even poets: They’re audience members, also chosen at random right before the slam begins.

Each member of this impromptu panel awards poets a score from 0.0 to 10.0, and those with the highest scores earn the most points — which in turn determines their standings during the BuckSlam season and their eligibility for events like next month’s Grand Slam Finals.

The point, Goldberg said, is to make poetry accessible and fun for everyone, even those who are not poets. After all, he pointed out, the audience is just as important to the slam atmosphere as those behind the mic.

“If you’re an audience member, it’s so much more participatory and vocal and celebratory than a lot of poetry readings or literary events I’ve been to,” he said. “Not to talk smack about anybody else, because I love those things too. But poetry slam feels like you’re at a sporting event. There’s a lot of cheering and shouting and yelling and clapping, and it’s just a more lively atmosphere.”

Springboard for the Arts, a St. Paul-based nonprofit, has taken BuckSlam under its wing through its incubator program, which helps creative organizations like BuckSlam access grants, donations, and other sponsorship opportunities.

“There’s a lot of interest in exploring what this art form is,” Goldberg said. “It’s a really great method of self-exploration and vocalizing your feelings and speaking truth to power in a room full of supportive people — and not in isolation.”

If you go

What: BuckSlam MN’s Grand Slam Finals, the concluding poetry slam tournament of its inaugural season.

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 3.

Where: The Black Hart of Saint Paul; 1415 W. University Ave.

Cost: $5 suggested donation, but no one is turned away for lack of funds.

Age limit: All ages. Yes, the Black Hart is a bar; those under 21 will be allowed to enter the venue specifically to attend BuckSlam’s event but are asked to please check in with the bartenders.

Good to know: BuckSlam enforces a mask policy for audience members.

Related Articles

The New Standards, Dan Israel and Rogue Valley set for Lowertown Sounds concert series

‘Party for the Parks’ returning to celebrate St. Paul parks in June

Skywatch: The wily rabbit of winter

Literary calendar for week of March 24: Our Mary Ann Grossmann talks to author Danny Klecko

Ooey, gooey, delicious: Six of the best hot cheese dishes on Twin Cities restaurant menus