When I think of Spoken Word poetry, I think of someone speaking from their head and their heart. At the same time trying to relate to the audience, while speaking about their own experiences. Spoken word could be an outlet from actually writing a certain type of poetry, spoken word is more creative writing during your free time, words that you don’t have to actually worry about if they are written in a certain way. When people have to perform their spoken word poems out loud its almost like a performance in the sense that its very theatrical and their voices make you feel their emotion at the time.
I don’t think I could perform a spoken word poem in front of a crowd right now, but with practice of the craft, I wouldn’t mind. In class we read the poem “Puerto Rican Obituary” by Pedro Pietri and his poem was not only longer than a lot of the other poems we read in class but the way the speaker was trying to connect with its audience was deep. Even the film we watched in class “Louder Than a Bomb” with all the spoken word artists, everyone had a different style and a different way of performing their poem which was good to see.
I agree with your thoughts on spoken word poetry. I too believe it is sort of theatrical when performed. Poets use their bodies and change their voices and tone to emphasize parts of the poem that should be emphasized. I also agree that spoken word is in a way more creative than other forms of poetry. Other forms of poetry have strict rules regarding lines, rhyme scheme etc. Spoken word doesn’t have any rules. There doesn’t necessarily have to be any rhyming at all. In my experience, most spoken word poems don’t rhyme at all.