Poetry Out Loud Performances

I watched several Poetry Out Loud performances from 2009 and the one I liked the best was Stanley Jackson reciting "Sympathy" by Paul Lawrence Dunbar. What I really enjoyed about this performance was that he seemed to really grasp the meaning of the poem and he put a lot of emotion into the way he spoke. His performance was very dramatic, but it was a very dramatic poem so his dramatization worked well. Stanley also had excellent voice and articulation throughout his entire performance.

To me, this poem is about never giving up. The poet understands why a caged bird still sings after it has tried time and time again to escape from its cage, and he has sympathy for the caged bird. I think that the message that the poem is trying to portay is that even after you have tried to get a better life many times, you should never lose hope, and continue to "sing". In the poem, the poet shows the caged bird's sadness and grief, but how he still continues to sing and try again. Stanley Jackson showed the extreme sadness of the bird by putting a lot of emotion into his performance. I can definetely see why this performance was chosen to be in the finals.