At the sixth annual Bad Feminist Poetry Contest, held April 15, the men in the audience were not the only people made to feel uncomfortable. A record high number of 25 poets slammed men, underwear, and sometimes each other at the Greenleaf event.
“If it’s bad, but feminist, you get high points,” explained contest organizer and Assistant Professor of Religious Studies Eric Mortensen. “If it’s a quality poem, you get low points. And if it’s misogynist, then we just throw you out.”
At this year’s judging table, staff member Fatma Dogen, Assistant Professor of Philosophy Lisa McLeod, and senior Casey Thomas held the scoring cards. The three faced the difficult task of rewarding ugly imagery, disjointed rhythms, and contrived rhymes.
Competition was fierce, and poets used forms from haikus to free verse, and techniques from spoken word to chocolate bribes. With poetry scribbled on napkins and margins of homework, some competitors wrote winning works only minutes before taking the mic.
This year’s first-place prize was awarded to senior Nancy Klosteridis, who admitted, “I wrote this a half-hour ago in Lisa McLeod’s class.”
After initial disapproval with her distracted student, McLeod and the other judges awarded Klosteridis three 10s for her artful lamentation of America’s patriarchal status quo.
“Stripping free of my gender norms/ I’m ready to blow my feminist horn,” Klosteridis read from the back of a postcard. “I run through full moonlight, naked, thighs slapping with glee/ Not entirely what Americans told me to be.”
Some poems were too bad even for a bad poetry contest. The unruly audience tried, without success, to clap sophomore Ben Sepsenwol off the stage as he recited, “Pineapple, pineapple, pineapple good/ I eat feminism instead of food.”
But not all the feminist verses were awful. When first-year Ashley Escobedo recited her politically charged poem, one heckling audience member shouted, “You failed at failing!” For the first time in the history of the Guilford’s Bad Feminist Poetry Contest, the judges rewarded a quality poem.
“We reversed the rules and gave Ashley honorable mention,” said Mortensen. “It was just too good.”
Sophomore Arthur Wood admitted to writing his poem with the help of the Pines’ female residents. Points were deducted from Wood’s performance “because clearly, women did all the work and the guy took the credit,” said McLeod.
“Bras are like constraints of patriarchy upon my breasts/ Chafing these nipples of sustenance,” said Wood in a denouncement of gendered underwear. “Thongs are a wedgie into my world/ Cutting off the circulation of my womanhood.”
Assistant Professor of Religious Studies Jane Redmont examined identity in a parody of a performance art piece. Beginning in a flannel shirt, floor-length skirt, and oversized coat, she left the stage donning a leather jacket, black lace gloves, and riding crop. Her performance warranted 10s across the board.
Redmont shared her second-place prize with colleague Parveen Hasanali, assistant professor of religious studies, who also utilized props. Like Redmont, Hasanali receieved three 10s from the judging panel.
“Warm gooey chocolate, brown and sticky!” Hasanali yelled, unwrapping and licking a vagina-shaped chocolate while the audience of students laughed, cheered, and gasped.
But shock-value was not the sole purpose of the event.
“It’s a great space to examine feminism in a critical way – in an appreciative way,” said Thomas. “And we also get to talk about thumping and thwacking.”
Mortensen, the night’s master of ceremonies, acknowledged the delicate line that poets walk in mocking feminist poetry.
“It’s important for people who are learning to negotiate the boundaries of feminism, and to do so in part through humor,” said Mortensen. “It’s a pro-feminist event.”
“Each year, everyone does a good job of keeping the lines clear about laughing at how we do feminism in not-so-constructive ways. and laughing at feminism,” said Thomas.