Wrishija Roy, winner of the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science Poetry Out Loud Contest, traveled Feb. 1 with Dr. Scott Curtis, his wife Cathy Chen, Joy Carino and other members of the Grecian Urn Society to the regional Poetry Out Loud competition, where the three students continuing to state competition would be decided.

Poetry Out Loud is a poetry recitation contest for high schoolers. Carino, a senior at MSMS and two-time Poetry Out Loud State Champion, was responsible for getting MSMS students involved in Poetry Out Loud for the past two years. Last year, as a junior who had already competed at the national competition, she tried to organize a school-wide competition to give someone else a chance at competing. However, only three students competed and Carino ended joining the school contests and winning, going on to the national competition again.

This year, however, interest in the contest finally struck the student body. In December, Carino, with the help of Grecian Urn Society sponsor Dr. Scott Curtis, organized a contest that had several students participating. Wrishija Roy was chosen as MSMS’s representative, leading to her competition in Oxford.

Carino worked with Roy tirelessly in the weeks leading up to competition. Carino said, “Wrishija worked hard on all her poems and took various critiques into account throughout the whole process.” Roy performed the poems “Weighing In,” by Rhina P. Espallia and “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain” by Emily Dickinson.

On her performance at competition Carino with her veteran perspective said, “Wrishija’s performance was fantastic.  “Weighing In” by Rhina P. Espalliat was done beautifully, the best I’d ever seen her do it. I could feel the room go silent as the audience listened to her voice. Maybe I’m biased, but I believe her performance, out of everyone else’s, had the most emotional impact on the audience. “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain” by Emily Dickinson is an extremely difficult and weird poem to recite. Wrishija also performed it well, and I know she worked on it a lot.”

Carino was also the emcee of the event, due to her champion status, and when she announced the three students proceeding to state competition, she sadly did not announce Roy’s name. Roy will not be advancing further in this year’s Poetry Out Loud competition.

However, the future of Poetry Out Loud at MSMS seems bright to all. Roy had nothing but positive things to say about the experience. “I think the whole experience was pretty memorable.  It was my first time in Oxford, so just being able to see the beautiful town and the arts center was great.” She also said that she is definitely competing next year as well, planning to use “volume and emphasis a lot more to my advantage.” She also thanked Carino for the experience, saying, “Joy’s been awesome and incredibly supportive.  I’m not sure I would’ve done so well or even entered the contest if it wasn’t for her help.”

Carino says that for students interested in this Poetry Out Loud for next year, though she will have graduated, she expects her younger Grecian Urn Society members to work with Dr. Curtis to continue MSMS’s participation. Carino also said, “Start early. You may think you can memorize two poems the day before the contest, but can you really? Especially at a school like MSMS where there are tons of stuff to do every single day, take time to choose poems early and work on them little by little each day.”