Poetry slam in CH

Crown Heights have recently seen a poetry slam.

I don’t care about the slam itself, I am sorry to say. I am a lover of poetry, but find rhymeless English poetry lacking something. After you’ve eaten my grandaunt’s Napoleon, your generic version is not quite the same thing (but I do appreciate the effort). I do find the idea of self-expression, especially in CH (where one could say it is especially needed) wonderful.

I was, however, interested to read two posts about it, first describing the slammin’ crowd (“Wholly religious and yet wholly American and wholly secular — the sort of thing the Modern Orthodox seem to be striving for. Quite an accomplishment and hopefully a lesson to others as well.” — Very cool!), and the second describing a debate about the mixed sitting at the slam.

The posts:

Slam
Slam II

I found the second post quite very interesting, especially since I share many of the author’s personal experiences (replace an oversized tome of Talmud with an oversized science book) and questions about mingling among the genders — Halacha, Chassidus, community standards, normal social upbringing and all.

On the other hand, it’s interesting to consider the contents of this comment as well.

As I am reading the comments, it is getting better and better. For instance (abridged version).