On 9th August 2016, a small group of class XII students comprising Sangeet Khanna, Sakshi Singh, Bhavika Sharma, Vatsala Banerjee, Harshita Babbar, Surabhi Sanghi and Aanchal Juneja accompanied by their English teacher Ms. Vandana Misra headed to Springdales' School, Pusa Road to attend a workshop on Slam Poetry. On the way we discussed various books and authors, praising, in particular, the works of authors that filled our childhoods with great bedtime stories and the novels which still remain our best friends. These discussions acted as a prelude to the workshop.
On reaching the venue, we were asked to be seated in the auditorium. The workshop was conducted by Mr
Mr. Ikenna Onyegbula from Canada who is the 2014 World Poetry Slam Champion, 2014 Poet of Honour and a four time Canada National Poetry Slam Champion. She was accompanied by Kyle Louw, an internationally recognised spoken word poet from South Africa.
The workshop was conducted in collaboration with Delhi Poetry Slam. The first part of the workshop was conducted by Mr. Onyegbula. He kickstarted the workshop by presenting one of his own pieces. The performance was absolutely mesmerising and was greatly applauded by all. Next he initiated a few exercises to ' increase the energy of the room', as he put it. He then talked about how poetry has evolved over the years and how simple it is to write verse. He emphasised upon the fact that all of us have a weird inside within us which can be brought out through poetry. After this, he gave us six words - rhythm, monsoon, love, revolution, mother and wall, asking us to compose a poem using at least four of these words.
The poems that were penned were then asked to be shared with everyone who had by then learned to be empathetic listeners. The session focused on the importance of connectivity and how performing exercises to increase the connection between the individuals in the room is important.
After a quick break, the second part of the workshop with Mr. Kyle Louw began. He presented two of his pieces, which deeply impacted all of us the audience. He talked about the masks that everyone wears and which must be removed when writing, that we must not fight our feelings but become aware of them and learn to accept them. He said he believed in calming ourselves instead of Ikennas mantra of energising everyone! A few calming exercises followed after which we were instructed to think about and share our artistic statements.
The workshop concluded with participants writing lines of verse on the subject given. It was our biggest fears and our effort to to overcome them.
A vote of thanks followed after we got a chance to interact informally with the resource persons, Ikenna and Kyle. The experience was a treasure.
Aanchal Juneja (12-C).
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