Smego and Perez were introduced to the Upper School student body during an April 19 assembly. There, they performed their own works and talked about the art. By the time they departed nearly a week later, Rebecca Hadwen '18 and Debbie Ajagbe '17 announced plans to kick off a poetry club.

"All of us have a story, many stories that make up our story," Smego said. "We're not trying to turn you into poets, but give you the tools to tell your stories.... When we are telling our stories, we are part of a collective history that is made up of all of our histories."

Smego and Perez visited various freshmen classes to talk and teach poetry, urging students to express themselves. Eight of them did during the April 25 assembly, taking the stage to share poems they had written during the week. All drew heartfelt snaps and applause – and sometimes laughter or tears – from their peers.

Those who performed: Imari Sandoval ’17; Henry Schermerhorn ’19; Alex Boehm ’19; Olivia Castillo '19; Julia Bernstein '19; Ilija E. Wan-Simm '19; Zachary Vuong ’19; and Ajagbe.

Smego and Perez have worked with the state department to take poetry programs to communities worldwide. Smego just returned from Thailand and is in the midst of a college circuit; Perez is back from India, and preparing to return for a full-year residence.

Smego, a National Poetry Slam finalist, is co-founder of the youth arts and education non-profit Sacrificial Poets. In 2011, he helped created and lead the Poetic Portraits of a Revolution project that traveled to Egypt and Tunisia to collect stories of the popular revolutions and adapt them to spoken-word poems broadcast during an eight-week radio series on National Public Radio.

Perez, a poet, beat boxer, emcee and barber, was a member of the Sacred Sounds Slam team that took second at the Southern Fried Poetry Slam 2011 in Atlanta and the slam-master of The Misfits Slam Team that tied for second at the 2013 Southern Fried Poetry Slam in New Orleans.

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