Though hockey season is over, Buffalo is not done selecting its champions. This Friday Buffalo will determine its first ever Buffalo Poetry Slam Team to represent the city on the stages of the National Poetry Slam in Austin, Texas. Buffalo’s team will compete against 80 other teams—roughly 300 poets of all ages and styles.

Poetry slams are a relatively new animal in the literary jungle, having been around less than 20 years. What makes slams fun, and what Buffalo crowds have warmly embraced, is that the audience itself determines the winner. Five judges are randomly chosen from the crowd to give performers Olympic-style scores from zero to 10. The high and the low scores are dropped, and the remaining three are added to give the poet a score from zero (a poem that should never have been written) to a perfect 30 (a poem which causes spontaneous orgasms throughout the house). Friday’s slam lasts three rounds, and the top four poets will move on to Austin to represent Buffalo.

No one is going to deny that slam poets are weird beasts. It’s a hobby that requires you to spend long, unpaid hours pouring heart and soul onto page and stage only to have a complete stranger rate your life at a 7.3. Yet across the country and even the world, in hundreds of venues from New York City to San Francisco to Kalamazoo, slam poets continue to fight personal and cultural gravity by standing before a jury of their peers to be heard.

Buffalo is about to be graced by a visit from arguably one of slam’s finest, Buddy Wakefield. Buddy will be the feature at the Buffalo Poetry Slam Finals, performing a sort of inspirational bungee-jump for the audience and the 10 finalists. Here’s a sample of his autobiography:

“Born in Shreveport, LA, now claiming Seattle, WA as home, Buddy has been a busker in Amsterdam, a lumberjack in Norway, a street vendor in Spain, a team leader in Singapore, a re-delivery boy, a candy maker, a street sweeper, a bartender, a maid, a construction worker, manager of a CD store, a bull rider and a booking agent.

“In the spring of 2001 Buddy left his position as the executive assistant at a biomedical firm in Gig Harbor, WA, sold or gave away all he owned, moved into the small town of Honda Civic, and set out to live for a living, touring every major poetry venue in North America through 2003.

“In 2004 he won the Individual World Poetry Slam Finals thanks to the support of anthropologist and producer Norman Lear (yes, that Norman Lear), then successfully defended that title at the International Poetry Festival in Rotterdam, Netherlands against the national champions of seven European countries with works translated into Dutch. In 2005 he won the Individual World Poetry Slam Championship title again. These days, Buddy has been featured on NPR, the BBC, and HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, and still tours full-time.

“Wakefield is a growth junkie, an expert witness to the moon, avid player of marbles in the trees, elated son of a guitar repair woman, wingman of Giant Saint Everything, is void of S.T.D.s, and remains generally hopeful for his health despite an abusive relationship with free range pastry buffets. Buddy is known for delivering raw, rounded, high vibration performances of humor and heart while shifting social paradigms and making origami gum out of cross-cultural barriers through powerful accounts of release.”

“In the Fall of 1984 Anchor Bay Entertainment released a movie called Children of the Corn while Buddy lived in front of the corn fields near Niagara Falls, NY. This traumatic event (coupled with extensive exposure to Kenny Rogers and Lionel Richie) may or may not have led to Buddy being a sensitive poet puss who plays marbles in the trees, listens by talking, and keeps fingers on pulse.”

Artvoice recently caught up with the three-time individual poetry slam champion Buddy Wakefield via e-mail. Wakefield responded from an airport, en route to our fair city.

What would you tell people in a blue-collar, hockey-loving town that might make them want to shut off the game and go see “poetry” for the first time in their lives? There’s gonna be free beer. [Ed. note—Sadly the beer isn’t free on Friday, but every dollar raised goes to help to send the slam poets to Texas.]

When was the first time you ever got up in front of people and felt like a performer? I played Mr. Tooth Decay in the first grade.

Why did you finally decide to make a career of it? It’s a process not an event.

Why not guitar? I’m a mediocre guitar player. Mediocrity’s lame.

What’s important about winning the competition? Because when I don’t win God hates me.

If you could get to the heart of what you’re trying to tell people with your poetry in one sentence, what would it be? Hallelujah.

What’s for breakfast? Muffchops.

Tell us some of the jobs you had before being a professional poet. Prostitute, elementary school substitute teacher, lumberjack.

How does an aspiring writer get to trust their voice, what they put on the page? Ya gotta build great abs and make lots of money before you can trust your own voice. You will know it’s your own voice because people will approve of it. When the following sound starts to resonate from within, “moo,” that’s your true voice.

Once they do that, how can they begin to get comfortable performing? Relax it.

What’s your favorite type of audience? Big fan of audiences with backbones.

What do you hope to experience in Buffalo? I spent from four years old through sixth grade in them parts. Binghamton, North Tonawanda, mostly Sanborn. This time I hope to experience less Children of the Corn and butt rock.

How can we show you who we are? Proper identification.

If poetry transcends time and space, will we be friends forever? I’ll need more information. Do you have any STDs? Does forever have music in it? Will there be air?