Excerpts from Let Them Eat MoonPie®

From Chapter 2:     We rolled into Asheville for the first time as a ragtag bundle of nerves and fears, hoping to perform poetry that would stand out regionally. We weren't arrogant enough to think we could do it, but we hoped. David and Bonnie Hobbes, the owners of the green door (and the upstairs Broadway Arts Building), were among the first to meet us. Bonnie worked the door, while David maintained the bar, during the shows. The green door was an unusual space, accessed by a large green door in the middle of an alley behind Broadway, with a very long room holding a likewise long stage backed by black curtains, and it felt like someone's basement had been converted into a performance space. There were a number of patio-style tables and chairs around the room, which would over the years be at least partly replaced by long wooden tables with benches. The green door would, among many other things, be the first experience for at least most of the team with a unisex bathroom. The bathroom was divided into two stalls, and was covered in stickers and signs for various performers and groups. The primary person in charge of Southern Fried was Allan Wolf, the Slammaster of Asheville, and his friendly organization skills led him to be the virtual organizer of the entire region. In future years, he would host regionals planning events, organize tours across the South for the London Farrago team, and regularly perform at venues and festivals around the region. Allan worked for Poetry Alive!, and many Slam poets toured across the country with that organization, performing famous poetry for local schools by day and featuring their own materials by night. Allan's impact on poetry in the Southeast should not be underestimated. He was a ringmaster of an emcee, running his shows with a natural ease and manic wit, occasionally doing something unusual like juggling or spontaneous audience-involving poetry, but never making the show into self-promotion. The shows were never about Allan, but always about the poets who crossed his stage on any given night. The work he put into his shows reflected in the sizes of his audience, and the enthusiasm poets and audience alike had for Slam nights. Asheville became a sort of Mecca of poetry in the Southeast, leading many poets to move there for several years, and the vision of Southern Fried was coherently held together by Allan in so many ways.   From Chapter 7:     At 7 PM, we competed in round two, upstairs. We competed against Winston-Salem, Asheville, Lexington, Roanoke, and the indies. For this round, scores ran high again, from 25.9 to 29.4. Sophie and Brandon both ranked high, with 28.3 each, as the first two poets up. Johnson City looked like it would finally have a brief moment in the spotlight, after more than five years of competition, when Jody Sigler took his slot. His poem, a humorous string of pick-up lines, had amused a few crowds, and I had encouraged him to compete with it. However, early in the poem, individual competitor Jon Williams (sitting with our strongest competitors, Team Winston-Salem) began snapping. Jon decided that the only appropriate response to Jody’s poem was the Chicago “I’m bored with this poem” snap. Jody faltered, became unsure of himself, and his score reflected it. Even with his lower score, we almost pulled it out. I anchored the round, using some of my anger toward Jon to fuel the emotion behind my piece, which scored a 28.6. At the end of the round, we were told that Johnson City had won the bout, but by the next morning, it seems that Winston-Salem had protested that Richard Still’s score was incorrect, and we were knocked out of our slot. Nonetheless, Pat Storm (who had caught part of the round) said we’d always have won that round in his mind.  Also memorable in that round was Ted Pope, who competed as an indie. His trademark smile back, he performed a great piece with flair, but forgot it midway through. Ted walked away, mid-poem, in tears. We talked later, and I told him that, one preacher’s kid to another, I’d always respected him. He explained that the depressions were pulling him down.  Lexington’s Dave Hounsel said, “I remember Nick and I performing our first team piece (inspired by Asheville's awesome Smedleys the previous year) to a hapless vixen sitting at the bar during round two. We both professed our undying love to her and ignored her disgruntled boyfriend who took her out of there in short order after the piece was finished. We were proud.” As they should have been. It was fun to watch. From Chapter 10:     Another noticeable point in the competitions is the philosophy of each team that arrives. These can be broken down fairly simply into a few basic beliefs. For instance, there are teams who attend to compete, but their primary reason for existing is to have a good time and socialize with other teams. When they lose, they grab a beer and settle down with members of their own team (or, often, members of other teams who haven’t made it to the finals) to watch the rest of the show without the stress of competition. Other teams, meanwhile, are there for the win, no matter how many people they have to walk on to get it. These teams rightly practice heavily ahead of time, but they arrive with no intention of being friendly to the other teams. Teams that aren’t likely to be a threat to them, they ignore completely. These teams also have a tendency to protest in any way they can, aiming to find the loophole that lets them edge into the next round while working hard to prevent anyone from arguing about their unsportsmanlike conduct. And while I understand that tendency in many teams, it was less understandable in Southern Fried, where we worked hard to stress that the festivals were meant for community, not competition (“the points are not the point, the point is poetry,” is Allan Wolf’s catch-phrase not just for Slam, but especially for Slam in our region). There are variations on the two camps, of course. There are teams who fully intend to win, and they come in fully practiced and strongly organized, but they act in a friendly yet professional manner. These teams are the ones who more frequently win the Southern Fried festivals, though not always. We may claim that the best poet comes in last, but often, that’s not true…Great poets with great performance skills and practice can work magic over an audience. Team Asheville had a tendency to be this sort of team most of the time.