Congrats to the 2024 MeatGrinder Poets! Time to get ready for 2025. The tournament will be held July 19, 2025 at Kafe Kerouac (2250 N. High St., Cols., OH).
The poetry slam is a proud, long-standing poetry tradition. For over 40 years poetry slams the world over have changed the face of the art form all over the planet. The Ohio MeatGrinder Slam operates in the spirit of the roots of Slam, putting a good time had by all above all other considerations. To this end, we’ve opted to install only a handful of rules and to distill the experience of a true roots-based poetry slam into one soul-packing day of poetry … no drama, no fuss.
We will have a morning get-together, orientation, preliminary bouts, finals and an after party all in the span of one day. That’s where the grind comes in. It’s like a Slam festival but without all of the workload, demands and infrastructure that larger festivals require. You come, you enjoy the shows, you go home. Please tip your bartender.
This event is about allowing poets to play with the form of poetry in ways that traditional slam competitions often prohibit. You might see a team with props or in costume or playing instruments during a poem. The goal of the poets is to engage you and we encourage them to do so as they see fit, while still attempting to bring honest and earnest poems to the stage and without turning all of this into an actual competitive agenda. We don’t care about who wins and we’re largely disinterested in creating an environment in which anyone else does either.
Ohio and the rest of the Midwest is home to a great many phenomenal poets and writing traditions. We want to celebrate those artists and legacies. It is our hope that you witness every manner of voice, story, and emotion that we can fit into one day, and that you walk away happy to have been part of a truly unique and profound artistic experience whether you be an audience member or a competing poet.
See you at the slam!
Louise Robertson & Scott Woods
Founders – The Ohio MeatGrinder Slam
Everything is at Kafe Kerouac (2250 N. High St., Columbus, OH) unless otherwise noted.
Early July 2025 Bout draw - online.
Saturday, July 19, 2025 – all day - The MeatGrinder
| 10am-11:30am | Registration Brunch. Join us for brunch at Kafe Kerouac. Official names of team and names of poets will be written down. Talk. Hug. Plot your poetic strategies for that magical moment when you hope one of your best friends in the world doesn't do as well as you do <3. |
| 11:30am | Team Orientation. This is for the teams. You need to be there to get your badges, find out the scoop, ask questions and realize there's no 10 second grace period on the poems. Rules. |
| 12-6:30 pm | Prelim Bouts. The magic happens here. 3 bouts; aiming for 12pm, 2:30pm, and 5pm. Joseph Harris is our host again this year. So when we say magic, we mean ALL the magic. All bouts are free. |
| 6:30-8 pm | Dinner Break. On your own. |
| 8-10 pm | Finals. Continuing magic! Still free! These poets have clawed their way through and ascended the five full inches to the finals stage. We salute you! |
| 10 pm | After Party at Streetlight Guild, 1367 E. Main St., Cols., OH. Food! Drink! House party style action! Free to the public! |
We'll put new information up as soon as we have it. Note: It'll be 3-poet teams again this year. We are planning for 12 teams now and that's the absolute limit this year. (We don't care how many poets are actually on your teams, but we're planning on doing 3x4 or 3x5 bouts.) No indies.
List of teams. (None yet.)
Bout Info
12pm bout:
TBD
2:30pm bout:
TBD
5pm bout:
TBD
Team Registration $150
Registration not open yet
When we get some press, we're putting the links here.