Project Success Hosts Virtual Poetry Workshop and Open Mic

From Instagram Live cooking shows to video adaptations of theater workshops, Project Success is transforming our programming to continue to engage students during the COVID-19 pandemic.

We’ve had to cancel hundreds of experiences for our students. In April, we had originally planned to be in Washington, D.C. for our 5th annual expedition to Howard University and the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

One of the students’ highlights from the D.C. trip in past years has been the powerful experience at the restaurant and poetry collective known as Busboys and Poets. Students typically hear from nationally known spoken-word artists and have the chance to perform their own poetry on stage.

Our team did not want our students to miss out on this unique opportunity, so we found a way to bring the experience to life for them virtually! This year, Project Success partnered with Pages Matam, the Director of Poetry Events for Busboys and Poets, to make this vision a reality. Pages is a Grand Slam National Poetry Champion and an international artist and educator from Cameroon, Central Africa. His love for poems began during his middle school years, watching a Power Rangers episode that involved the use of poetry, sparking his interest in the art form. Now, he shares that enthusiasm through workshops with students across the country.

Via Zoom, we held workshops with Pages for two days, which culminated on the third day in a powerful, virtual open mic session. Over the three-day period, Pages’ activities and exercises helped students cultivate their creativity as poetic wordsmiths. One exercise encouraged students to create a poem centered on name and identity because, as Pages said, “our names can tell a story.” Inspired by Pages’ guidance, Bezawit (Beza), a South High School junior, shared her poem, ‘Love and Tribe,’ highlighting her Ethiopian culture.

Beza explained that her poem was about tribe dynamics in her birth country and how we should love each other and embrace our beauty, instead of partaking in anger and rage based on perceived tribal differences. She said, “I grew [up] listening to this culture song called ‘Biher bihereseboch’ and when I wrote and read this [poem], a specific part … plays in my head:, ‘Our union is miscellaneous, it’s the secret of beauty’.”

When asked how she was feeling at the beginning of the workshop, another student, Nkechinyere, commented, “I feel like a book that needs to be written.”

Pages encouraged students to share their work and express themselves while being in a safe community together online. He provided constructive criticism and offered kind advice to students on how to bring their work to the next level. His energy and passion transcended the distance from Washington, D.C. to Minnesota. Students reciprocated his moxie, engaging with him and each other either audibly, via emojis and messages through Zoom chat and through the “clapping hands” reaction on their Zoom profiles. Despite the workshops being online, the final session had an air of an inviting café’s open mic.

Pages remarked that, “In the time of Covid-19 which has limited interactions, partnering with Project Success to create an interactive online community felt like the next best step and I couldn’t have asked for a better, more caring organization to work with. The students were so amazing and engaged, and it is a testament to how much they empower and encourage young people to be their best selves and participate in innovative programs.”

His favorite day, he said, was the last day of the three. “ Everyone joined in for an online open mic, shared their work from the week and other poems they worked on during their own time. There were some truly special students, and the staff joining in made it even more fun. I look forward to working with Project Success again! You all rock!”

Love and Tribe  

A country full of beauty 

Different culture and race 

80+ tribes  

Oromo, Amara, Afar, Gurage… 

bringing out the beauty  

within each other 

This is my country, Ethiopia 

A place where I grew up in  

but what’s the point 

When there is no 

peace within 

People coming at one another 

Killing each other  

because of their tribe 

and culture they received from their father 

Tribes trying to be superior 

trying to keep themselves 

at a high place 

Little did they know 

they are breaking the country 

while trying to separate themselves 

from this beauty 

Taytu and Menelik 

didn’t work this hard 

just to see the country falling apart 

What is going on with humanity? 

Why can’t we embrace  

Each other’s beauty? 

Why can’t we work together 

To develop our country? 

Why must we kill  

one another? 

Why must we hate on each other 

when we all came from  

one mother? 

Let me ask you, 

Is this what you want? 

to pass to your kids? 

Is this the place you want 

your children to grow up in? 

A place full of hatred? 

A place without peace? 

You say we are the future hope 

to the country 

You say we are the next 

receiver of my country 

But the place you will give us 

is a place full of hatred 

Teach us how to love each other 

not how to kill one another 

Replace the hatred with love 

Show us how to admire 

each other’s cultures 

Instead of hating people  

from different tribes 

I want a peaceful country 

I want a country where 

no one is killed because  

they are Orthodox  

or because they are  

Amarah or Oromo 

I want a place full of love 

a place where we  

shine our lights just like the stars 

at the night sky 

I want us to be just like the stars 

Let’s show our light  

Let’s make the sky beautiful 

Because the night sky is nothing 

Without our beautiful shining light. 

Bezawit (Beza)