Live Poetry at Richmix: Tilt’s London Liming presents a Come Rhyme With Me special

This month sees Come Rhyme With Me (CRWM) hosts Deanna Rodgers and Dean Atta, take their culinary-themed performance poetry evening to Richmix. London Liming will take place on Thursday the 9^th February, and will include music, food, dancing, ranting, raving, spoken word, slam, and a whole plethora of other carnivalesque festivities. The poetry portion of the evening will take the same structure as CRWM, which orders performance poets into the courses of a meal. I met with Dean Atta and attended CRWM, and he gave me a few details…

CRWM happens on the last Friday of every month at Cottons Caribbean Restaurant on Exmouth Market, and is a great evening for all food and poetry-lovers. Open Mic slots get the taste buds going, opening the stage to any poet desiring the chance to serve up one short poem. A stirring starter poet, a heavier main poet and a lighter dessert poet then take to the stage, concocting a verbal banquet of verse, anything from political, touching, empowering, and dark, to comic, playful and lustful.

But the structural genius of CRWM doesn’t just lend well to terrible punning. As with CRWM, London Liming is sure to see the material and accolade of each poet fit perfectly to their course of the meal. At London Liming, Dean and Deanna will co-host with Melanie Abrahams, and begin the evening with pre-planned appetizers, followed by the usual courses of spoken word. Special guests James Massiah and Dougie Hastings are sure to take the appetizer slots, whilst Inua Ellams will surely take the main course, heading the Liming line-up. Expect to see FLOetic Lara and Jasmine Cooray step up to the dessert and starter slots, a level of exposure that would be a great blessing to any upcoming poet.

The CRWM structure (a conceptual masterpiece) is the brainchild of Dean Atta and Deanna Rodger, who curate the evening together. Dean is a huge performance poet who began his extremely successful career after reading at the Poetry Café in Covent Garden, after which he was immediately asked to read on BBC Radio 4 programme; Bespoken. He has since been a part of the Roundhouse Rubix Poetry Collective, has been named “the iPhone poet”, and has won awards, commissions, feature slots, and done readings just about everywhere in London. He is also probably one of the most wonderfully welcoming people I have ever met. From our brief meeting, I could tell that where he goes in poetry, we should probably all follow.

Deanna Rodger is equally exciting and is leading poetry in innovative directions. Having won the UK SLAM! Championships at her first attempt in 2007 at the age of 18, she has since partaken in the World Cup of Slam, hosted the Lyric Lounge, and was a finalist in the BBC Radio 4 Poetry Slam Competition. Both Deanna and Dean are accomplished spoken word poets, and they have such a rich stage dynamic together that London Liming will be more than worth the £5 entry, even if they were the only features. The diverse voices of the Come Rhyme With Me setup means Deanna and Dean will bring with them a polyvocal evening of poetry.