Damien Flores features at the Sedona Poetry Slam

Sedona AZ (November 1, 2021) – After the successful return of slam poetry to Sedona in October, the Sedona Poetry Slam proudly welcomes New Mexico slam poetry icon Damien Flores to the stage on Saturday, Nov. 13. 

Performance poets will bring high-energy, competitive spoken word to the Mary D. Fisher Theatre starting at 7:30 p.m. with Flores performing between rounds. 

Flores is an award-winning poet, comedian, author, actor, educator and radio broadcaster from Albuquerque, N.M.

A two-time National Poetry Slam Champion and two-time College Unions Poetry Slam Champion, he has published three books: “Junkyard Dogs,” “El Cuento de Juana Henrieta,” and “A Novena of Mud.” 

Flores and his works have been featured in several anthologies, magazines and newspapers, including Albuquerque the Magazine, Bomb Magazine and El Palacio. He is a past presenter at TEDxABQ, was twice named Poet of the Year by the New Mexico Hispano Entertainers Association and received the Lena Todd Award for Creative Nonfiction from the University of New Mexico. 

He produces the monthly open mic and slam called Poetry & Beer as well as the regional invitational Southwest Showdown Poetry Slam and the local ABQ Slams Championship Tournaments. He is also a Radio Free America DJ & hosts the Spoken Word Hour on 89.9 KUNM.

A poetry slam is like a series of high-energy, three-minute one-person plays, judged by the audience. Anyone can sign up to compete in the slam for the $75 grand prize and $25 second-place prize. To compete in the slam, poets will need three original poems, each lasting no longer than three minutes. No props, costumes nor musical accompaniment are permitted. The poets are judged Olympics-style by five members of the audience selected at random at the beginning of the slam.

Slam poetry is an art form that allows written page poets to share their work alongside theatrical performers, hip-hop artists and lyricists. Poets come from as far away as Phoenix, Tucson and Flagstaff, competing against adult poets from Sedona and Cottonwood, college poets from Northern Arizona University and youth poets from Sedona Red Rock High School. All types of poetry are welcome on the stage, from street-wise hip-hop and narrative performance poems, to political rants and introspective confessionals. Any poem is a “slam” poem if performed in a competition. All poets get three minutes per round to entertain and inspire the audience with their creativity.

Mary D. Fisher Theatre is located at 2030 W. SR 89A, Suite A-3, in West Sedona. Tickets are $12. For tickets, call 282-1177 or visit SedonaFilmFestival.org.

The upcoming poetry slams of the season will be held Saturdays, Jan 15; Saturday, March 5, featuring Bernard “The Klute” Schober, of Phoenix; April 23; and May 14.

The prize money is funded in part by a donation from Verde Valley poetry supporters Jeanne and Jim Freeland.

Email foxthepoet@yahoo.com to sign up early to compete or by the Friday before the slam or at the door the day of the slam. Poets who want to compete should purchase a ticket in case the roster is filled before they arrive. 

For more information, visit sedonafilmfestival.com or foxthepoet.blogspot.com.

Founded at the Green Mill Tavern in Chicago in 1984 by Marc Smith, poetry slam is a competitive artistic sport designed to get people who would otherwise never go to a poetry reading excited about the art form when it becomes a high-energy competition. Poetry slams are judged by five randomly chosen members of the audience who assign numerical value to individual poets’ contents and performances.

Poetry slam has become an international artistic sport, with more than 100 major poetry slams in the United States, Canada, Australia and Western Europe. Slam poets have opened at the Winter Olympics, performed at the White House and at the United Nations General Assembly and were featured on “Russell Simmon’s Def Poets” on HBO.

Sedona has sent four-poet teams to represent the city at the National Poetry Slam in Charlotte, N.C., Boston, Cambridge, Mass., Oakland, Calif., Decatur, Ga., Denver and Chicago.