Poetry Slam at the Cantab Lounge: 2008 Team Bios

The 2008 team was selected over a two-night, six-round slam of the top twenty slammers in the Cantab Lounge. This year sees the return of three former team members and one first-year slammer. This August, they will travel to Madison, Wisconsin, for the 2008 National Poetry Slam.

Presenting the 2008 Boston-Cantab Slam Team:

Educator, activist, romantic, entertainer, poet, and actor, Harlym125 ("Bruce Banner") lives the art form with conviction toward preserving its purity, artistic freedom, and creativity. Having graced the stages of prisons, night clubs, churches, colleges, high schools, and Fortune 500 Companies nationwide, 125 returns to the Cantab team in 2008 after a year away from the fold.

Omoizele Okoawo ("Oz") has been a force in poetry slam for nearly a decade, both as remarkable performer and talented coach. A perennial team semi-finalist at the National Poetry Slam, he placed in the top ten individually ranked poets in the 2007 competition. This marks his second year on the Cantab team.

Simone Beaubien is a nine-year veteran of the New England poetry scene and host of the Boston Poetry Slam at the Cantab Lounge. She has competed at five National Poetry Slams (representing the Cantab every time) and has read her work in colleges, bookstores, theaters, and bars from Portland, Maine, to Vancouver, British Columbia, to Del Ray Beach, Florida.

April Ranger became an almost instant favorite when she began reading regularly on the Cantab open mic: since day one, her vivid, original imagery has been eliciting longing sighs from the audience, making her the local master of the Oh-I-Wish-I-Had-Written-That poem. Already a produced playwright and published poet, this will be April's first slam team.

You can see the team onstage every Wednesday at the Cantab Lounge, or check their schedule of appearances. To book the team to perform at your venue or event, email cantab@slamnews.com.

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