DANSON KAHYANA

This month's poetry event at Amazink, Kayamandi, was a huge success, with breathtaking performances from over twenty poets who registered for the three cash prizes up for grabs in the poetry slam. Attended by more than 200 people, SLiP’s InZync Poetry Slam provided soothing melodies to the ear and quite a lot for the eye as well – poets’ costumes, gestures, facial expressions, and other paralinguistic enjoyments.

Out of the ten poets who made it to the second round, five were selected for the final round. Three of these were declared winners: JC van Schalkwyk for the first prize worth R1000, Mambesi Goje for second prize (R500), and Rimestein for third prize (R250).

Rimestein proudly rapping in jou ma se taal

Most of the poems performed addressed social issues such as inter-racial cooperation, respect for human beings, and poverty. In her prize-winning poem, Mambesi Goje challenged the audience to redefine the colour black by giving it positive attributes. “Why should a bad Christmas be a black one?”she asked.

Mambesi in an intimate moment with the crowd

One of the finalists, Prudence Ntshediseng Tlooko, started off a poem addressing the abuse of sex workers with a shocking line: “I am the vagina”. She was perhaps the most courageous of the competitors, using a diction that undid lexical prohibitions common in many societies.

In his acceptance poem, the winner of the first prize, JC, urged the audience to look at all human beings as one family.

JC van Schalkwyk wows the crowd one last time

Other noteworthy performances were by MC Adrian Different, who kept the audience alive and keen, and the judges, whose opinions seldom matched. Prof. Leon de Kock was the generous one, at one point giving ten out of ten points to Prudence Ntshediseng Tlooko, while Riaan Oppelt was the hard-to-impress guy who gave the same piece a mere seven. The other judge, Khanyi Mbongwa, stood somewhere in the middle, mediating between generosity and miserliness.

A big thank-you to the SLiP team for an evening that everybody enjoyed. Yes, this project is undoubtedly discovering and promoting talent.