Last modified: Thursday, March 22, 2007 12:57 AM EDT Yeats, it's not BY JANETTE SEARS STAFF WRITER Art will come to life Saturday as the Attleboro Arts Museum brings poetry to the people. With innovative performances from amateurs and seasoned poets, the museum's Second Annual Poetry Slam will offer a whole new experience for museum-goers, according to executive director, Mim Fawcett. The event is not just for performing poets, who will be able to compete for cash prizes if they want to enter the slam, but also for those who want to come and listen to poetry of all types, including the work of nationally-known poets Molly Meacham and Harlym125. "This will be an energetic afternoon of unique poetry and performance," Fawcett said. "Our SlamMaster and guest poets are bringing a powerful edge to this year's event. Participants and audience members will experience a different dimension to the Attleboro Arts Museum." A poetry slam is the competitive art of performance poetry, which puts a dual emphasis on writing and performance, encouraging poets to focus on what they're saying and how they're saying it. To make the most of the event, which is sponsored by the Attleboro Cultural Council, the museum has partnered with Simone Beaubien, celebrity SlamMaster from The Cantab Lounge in Cambridge. The Cantab Lounge is an internationally known venue for slam poetry, and Beaubien has arranged for some of its featured poets to participate in the museum's poetry slam, which she says she is excited about conducting. "Poetry slam is a movement that began in bars and underground music venues with the idea of bringing poetry to people who might not otherwise hear it," Beaubien said. "Although the movement doesn't predate the genre of performance poetry, it's had quite a bit to do with its development and modern style. As a result, the poetry we present in slams has diverged somewhat from the 'academic' world of poetry, which is the sort of stuff one might expect to see presented at a museum-sponsored event. "I always enjoy bringing performance poetry into a museum, a library, a high school, or any place where people might expect something different from a poetry show; poetry slam has always been about breaking expectations, and I hope this event changes some audience perceptions about what poetry has to be." The poets that Beaubien has arranged to be featured at the museum are Meacham, of Chicago, and Harlym125 of New York, who also will conduct poetry workshops with students before the event. Both poets are experienced poetry slammers with national performance credentials and recent education experience. They also vary so greatly in their styles that Beaubien says they offer a fairly accurate representation of the two prevalent schools of performance poetry seen in slam today. As described by Beaubien, Meacham is a Chicago poet and dialect coach, known for her dense imagery and storytelling performance style, and Harlym125 is a New York-Boston transplant and hip-hop activist with extraordinary presence. "Expect to be surprised, entertained, and moved by the work of these two deeply different and multi-talented poets,' Beaubien said. As arranged by Beaubien, Meacham and Harlym125 will conduct workshops for teens from Attleboro High School, Bishop Feehan, and the Network School at the museum the day before the poetry slam. Meacham, who also teaches poetry to teens in Chicago, says she is looking forward to the workshop as well as the event on Saturday. "I have a great love for language, so any time I get to work with kids and poetry and performance, it's also very exciting for me," she said. "I'm going to focus on revision because I feel that that's just as important as getting the first few ideas on the page," she said with regard to how she'll help students on Friday. As for the style of performance she herself will do on Saturday, Meacham says, "I'm distinctly Southern and distinctly feminine, so a little slice of both." The afternoon event will kick off with an open mike for anyone who wants to read their poetry. Featured will be students from the three local schools participating in the workshops. The day's events will culminate with a poetry slam, a competition in which poets perform their work and are judged, Olympic-style, by members of the audience. Storytelling, lyricism and stand-up comedy all come together in this modern oral tradition of poetry. Entry in the slam is open to the public and all interested comers are invited to throw their names in the hat to compete for the top cash prize of $200. All-star competitors will include Nantucket SlamMaster Len Germinara and last year's defending champion, Ryk McIntyre, plus, no doubt, a few ringers from the surrounding poetry slam scenes.