URBAN-15 announces an OPEN CALL to all poets living in Bexar County for consideration in the Invitational 2023 MEGA CORAZON Poetry Festival.  Poets accepted into the festival will be eligible to compete for the Gregg Barrios “Precious Words Prize” of $500 for the best performance presentation. 

Monday, April 17,2023 is the kickoff of the month-long MEGA CORAZON celebration, a hybrid live/online spoken word marathon that is part of San Antonio’s National Poetry Month participation. This festival presents San Antonio’s poetic tradition that combines street, classical, and slam performance styles in a production that is improvisational, at times painful, and choreographed for a highly visual impact. While this year’s lineup is still in development, previously participating poets include Poets Laureates Carmen Tafolla, Laurie Ann Guerrero, Jenny Browne, Octavio Quintanilla and Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson; internationally recognized writers Naomi Shihab Nye, Nephtali De Leon and John Phillip Santos; “Slam Poetry” champions Anthony “The Poet” Flores and, and many other talented local poets. The Gregg Barrios “Precious Words Prize” was created by world-renowned poet and author Gregg Barrios in 2021 to award the Mega Corazon poet selected by the on-line audience for the best performance during the festival. The 2021 winner was Amalia Ortiz, 2022 winner was Jessica Tilton Zertuche. 

Guidelines for consideration in The 2023 Mega Corazon Poetry Festival: 

• Poets, of any age, currently must reside in Bexar County.  
• Poets must submit a 3 to 5–minute audition video (or online link) displaying original poetry performance. Selection will be based on power of content and power of performance commitment. Auditions videos will not be judged on production expertise, video technique nor platform.  
• List of publications, if any 
• Artist bio notes and artistic statement 

Please email materials to events@urban15.org.  There is no entry fee to submit application materials, and the deadline is Friday, February 10, 2023.  

Final selections will be announced March 1, 2023. Poets selected, this year’s Mega Corazon will be pre-recorded live in our studio (2500 S. Presa 78210) during March.  The internet broadcast of all performances will also be accessible free of charge and without a password on URBAN-15 website’s at https://urban15.org/live-stream.