Elevating the Word Movement

A popular web resource is being re-opened as several sites. An Open Call has been announced to encourage submission of links, new items, CD or book reviews, new product announcements, web site openings and poetry open mikes, readings and slams.

The poetry resources which formerly existed at www.fireseek.com have been migrated to several new web sites, including www.ihopoets.com and www.urbanpoetic.com.

The haiku resources at www.fireseek.com were widely acclaimed, earning them a permanent listing in dmoz.org, as well as several reccomendations from several acadmics who study and teach haiku. To give both the haiku resources and the friendly "I Seek Critique" forums more exposure, they were migrated to a new site, the International House of Poets, or http://www.ihopoets.com.

This still left the poetry resources for the performance poet, which quickly gained popularity with the advent of publicity of such varied resources as recent hip-hop releases by the hip-hop group "The Roots", public access shows on local cable stations and on PBS, as well as commercial television shows with national markets, such as Def Poetry Jam, currently airing on HBO.

Towards this end, UrbanPoetic.com was re-created from the ashes of www.fireseek.com, to promote the news, CD releases, self-published and mass produced works of performance and slam poets, as well as poetry venues internationally.

Why the change? Co-owner of the pareent company, Universal Soul Syndicate, Tinu Abayomi-Paul, puts it this way: "Our site was very popular because it was the only resource of its kind in creation, but it grew too varied in focus, too quickly for our multiple streams of visitors to keep up.

We had intended to initially just move the resource to its own server and rename it, but you can't ignore demand. According to Wordtracker, searches for words related to poetry have gone from the among the top 200 clean words searched for in search engines a year ago to the top 50 today. We're in the best position to serve the many diverse markets of people who want to know what the so-called word movement is all about."

As their website states, the site is "a collaborative project started by urban poets, for urban poets.

Having watched art forms such as jazz, contemporary fiction and hip-hop go the way of the pre-packaged commodity, we have realized that WE the consumers, WE the creators, are powerful in the future of our latest art form. We who pay for the CDs and chapbooks are often also the ones recording them, and, we pay to go to the poetry readings are often the ones reading in them. Therefore the movement goes nowhere without us. Recognizing that, we want everyone's voice to be heard.

Whether you are involved in, or a fan of, spoken word, performance poetry, contemporary poetry, or any other art form that touches on finessing poetic expression, we invite you to join us, and elevate the word movement.

Submit your articles, thoughts, poems, interviews, reviews, links or event for consideration now, during our grand re-opening. shameless self promotion is highly encouraged. our peaceful bulletin board guarantees a response to your poetry."

The parent company, Universal Soul Syndicate promises dozens more sites of similiar ilk will be created from the remnants of their former super-site, www.fireseek.com, such as an upcoming site which focuses on calls for submissions for serious poets, and another with comprehensive listings of the international poetry venues which are gaining in popularity as the new world of urban poetry is born.

If the recent outpouring of support from the internet community is any indication, collaboration is the future of this art.