“Unless you have a smile from ear to ear, the world will never accept you.”
Don’t miss our final video from the 2015 Get Lit Classic Slam, featuring incredible student poets from across Southern California!
Sabrina Benaim – “Explaining My Depression to My Mother” (3,000,000 views!)
“My depression is a shapeshifter. One day it’s as small as a firefly in the palm of a bear; the next, it’s the bear.”
Congratulations to Sabrina Benaim on becoming the fourth poet on the Button YouTube to top 3,000,000 views on her video! Check it out below.
Best of Button Week 42
“Loneliness is my specialty, like trembling is that of an earthquake, or how a closet is supposed to hide all the right parts of me.”
Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button Playlist, featuring the hottest recent videos on the Button YouTube channel. Updated every week! Today’s additions: Iain Kohn, Rachel Wiley, Crystal Valentine, & Carrie Rudzinski. Congratulations poets!
Best of Button Week 41
“My hobbies include editing my life story, hiding behind metaphors, and trying to convince my shadow that I’m someone worth following.”
Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button Playlist, featuring the hottest recent videos on the Button YouTube channel. Updated every week! Today’s additions: Rudy Francisco, Khamal Iwuanyanwu, Tonya Ingram & Bobby Crawford. Congratulations poets!
Best of Button Week 40
“Maybe he saw through the masks I built ever since I realized that sometimes it’s safer in costume.”
Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button Playlist, featuring the hottest recent videos on the Button YouTube channel. Updated every week! Today’s additions: Javon Johnson and Patrick Roche. Congratulations poets!
Hieu Minh Nguyen – “Regions Hospital” (Button Live)
“It’s funny, how I remember most the flaring octave of his laughter. His hands, mostly skin now, hold vacant and deliberate at my sleeve.”
Check out this amazing poem from Hieu Minh Nguyen, performing at Button Poetry Live. If you’re in the Twin Cities area, don’t miss December’s show on Monday night! Check it out here.
Best of Button Week 39
“If your God really wanted you in my pants, he would’ve made you me.”
Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button Playlist, featuring the hottest recent videos on the Button YouTube channel. Updated every week! Today’s additions: Theresa Davis, Crystal Valentine, and Amber Tambyln. Congratulations poets!
Best of Button Week 38
“If you develop an eating disorder when you are already thin to begin with, you to go the hospital. If you develop an eating disorder when you are not thin to begin with, you are a success story.”
Don’t miss this week’s Best of Button Playlist, featuring the hottest recent videos on the Button YouTube channel. Updated every week! Today’s additions: Blythe Baird and a group piece from the House Slam team. Congratulations poets!
Javon Johnson // “cuz he’s black” (Animation)
Update on Button Poetry & TruArtSpeaks
On October 29th and 30th, representatives of Button Poetry met with representatives of TruArtSpeaks at Golden Thyme Coffee & Cafe in Saint Paul for a racial equity/social justice analysis and training moderated by Gabriella Anais Deal-Márquez of Voices for Racial Justice.
Over the course of the two-day meeting, we discussed details and addressed lingering questions in regards to last year’s prospective Button Educational Initiative and the events surrounding it, and their impact on individuals and communities in the Twin Cities. We also examined racial equity and social justice, and how they can be practiced and committed to both individually and organizationally, as well as the historical and present impact of oppressive systems and white supremacy. Many productive and valuable conversations occurred, and the meeting ended on a positive and encouraging note.
We at Button are committed to navigating our space in the Twin Cities poetry communities responsibly, equitably, and transparently. We would like to recognize TruArtSpeaks’ ongoing and invaluable work in the Twin Cities, and extend our thanks and gratitude to their organization for coordinating this training and this dialogue. We would also like to thank Gabriella for facilitating. Any questions from members of the community for Button Poetry in regards to this meeting, last year’s proposed initiative, or surrounding issues can be addressed to us at buttonpoetry@gmail.com, and we will do our best to respond thoroughly and promptly.