The Prose Bowl: A Night Of Spoken Word with Get Lit

It’s a celebration of L.A. poetry at LAist with Get Lit - Words Ignite! Get Lit youth poets, standout local artists, and two nationally-renowned featured poets will get together for a night of spoken word performance hosted by Get Lit’s Mason Granger (he/him). Come early to enjoy snacks, sips, a DJ set from Mike Merchant, and tons of cool people to connect with in the name of poetry. Drinks and music start at 6 p.m. and the show kicks off at 7 p.m.

Featured poets will be Angélica Maria and RJ Walker.

GET LIT YOUTH POETS

• Jasmine Minchez*
• Marlee Porter*
• Jada Leung*
• Celia Douglas

This program may contain some mature language or themes.

ABOUT MASON GRANGER
Mason Granger is the Deputy Director at Get Lit. Originally from Philadelphia by way of Willingboro, NJ, Mason is a poet with 19+ years of professional experience on stage & in classrooms across 49 states and six countries as part of the performance poetry trio, The Mayhem Poets. In 2014, he created SlamFind, a digital platform to connect fans of poetry videos with the poets & live poetry venues where these videos are born. Connecting the poetry community to itself and the rest of the world continues to be the foundation of his work to this day.

Between 2016-2018, Mason was the official videographer for Poetry Slam Inc., producing several iconic poetry videos that continue to garner millions of views across multiple platforms. In the spirit of his mission of always keeping the ‘live’ in ‘live poetry’, he also hosted the weekly PoetNY open mic at Bowery Poetry Club in NYC from 2017-2019 while also serving as Executive Director of Bowery Arts & Science through 2019.

Now as a Los Angeles resident in his fourth year with Get Lit, Mason continues to pursue creative projects while helping to shape the future of spoken word poetry education in the state of California and beyond.

ABOUT RJ WALKER
RJ Walker is a performance poet and voice actor from Salt Lake City, Utah. RJ Has performed at the national poetry slam numerous times, representing Salt Lake City, and Sugar House Utah. At the Individual World Poetry Slam he was a showcased poet on final stage and placed 6th overall at the 2017 Individual world poetry slam. RJ won the NPS Spirit of the Slam award for organizing the first Compliment Deathmatch event. The next year he placed 4th at the National Poetry Slam with the Salt City Unified team. He is a winner of the Button Poetry video contest. Locally, RJ is the host and operator of The Greenhouse Effect Open Mic, SLC’s longest running open mic style event. RJ is a TEDX SLC speaker and was a keynote speaker for the League of Utah Writers’ Quills Conference.

ABOUT ANGÉLICA MARIA
Angélica Maria is a Chicana writer & musician from the San Fernando Valley, CA. She was a finalist of the National Poetry Slam 2017 amongst the top 400 competing poets within the U.S, Australia and Canada. She also ranked in the top 10 of women poets in the country in 2019 for the Women of the World Poetry Slam.

Her work has been featured on Button Poetry, Tedx, Facebook, and in 2021 she was hired to write the first Spanglish poem for a national sports team. The campaign aired on national television for The USL Women's Soccer League's National Campaign, in collaboration with Puma.

Her most recent project is a poetic Spanglish musical EP, Dulzura, which releases on October 15th, funded in part by Creative Capital and produced by an all Mexican women band and orchestra in Mexico City.

ABOUT THE POETS
Celia Douglas (she/her) is a writer, artist, and educator from Southern California. She has performed on national poetry slam stages, such as Women of the World Poetry Slam ’21 (WOWPS) & Southern Fried Poetry Slam ’21. She has hosted a variety of open mics and led creative writing workshops across the United States and the United Kingdom. She proudly earned her B.A. in English specializing in poetry and performance at HBCU Bennett College in Greensboro, North Carolina in 2018 and her M.A. Degree in Creative Writing and Education at Goldsmiths College in London, England in 2020. Her favorite color is blue and she hosts a monthly open mic in the San Fernando Valley.

Dharma Lemon (she/her) is a writer and teaching artist from Los Angeles. Dharma is quirky and passionate. She writes about feminism, body positivity, the environment, and racial injustice. Dharma is inspired by writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Huey P. Newton, Patricia Smith, and Amari Baraka. Dharma has performed and taught workshops at UCLA, CAAM, and The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. She has performed at Firedrill Fridays with celebrity activists like Jane Fonda, Joaquin Phoenix, Rainn Wilson, and many others. She has also performed in "Artists for Amazonia '' with Kali Uchis, Barbara Streisand, Morgan Freeman, among others. Lemon has been published in GLAFF’s book titled “Bridges”, performed in the closing ceremony of GLAFF, and presented a “Tree of Life award” to Patricia Aquette. Dharma's passion doesn't just register in her writing but also her love for activism.

*Get Lit Players
The Get Lit Players (GLPs) are our award-winning performance troupe of youth poets. They’ve performed at the United Nations, Hollywood Bowl, Lincoln Center and White House — to name a few! Every year they perform live for over 50,000 of their peers, and their videos have been watched online over 300 million times. Each of our Get Lit Players will spend the next year honing their skills and enjoying exciting and unique workshops, paid performance and networking opportunities, and a lifetime of support from Get Lit’s community.

ABOUT GET LIT
Los Angeles-based nonprofit GET LIT ignites student engagement, literacy, and young voices around the globe using the power of spoken word, technology, and community.

ACCOMMODATIONS
LAist is committed to providing access and accommodation for individuals with disabilities at our events. To request accommodations, please email events@laist.com or call us at (626) 585-5222 at least 7 days in advance of the event.