BYMEKAAR: Poetry Improvisation

BYMEKAAR is a concert series where artists are paired for spontaneous encounters on stage: an invitation for the audience to experience the magic of improvisation up close. 
BYMEKAAR offers space for play and experimentation. Performing artists create adventurous spoken word and musical performances on the spot, fully improvised and easily accessible. 
During this edition at Poetry International, poet Ellen Deckwitz, visual vernacular artist Brandon Lodder, and poet Patricia Jabbeh Wesley meet in a program curated by poet and dancer Sjaan Flikweert and poet-musician Marc Alberto.
Poets and audience connect through the unknown, resulting in a unique and unrepeatable exchange. 

Brandon Lodder

Brandon Lodder is a deaf poet, performer, and theatre maker specializing in poetry in Dutch Sign Language. He is a member of the Deaf poets collective Kitchen’s Light. Together with Boaz Blume, he has created performances such as Roept u maar!, Poems in Sign Language, and Exit Comfortzone, blending sign language, storytelling, and modern mime. Lodder’s work explores new forms of expression and communication and contributes to the visibility of Deaf artists within the Dutch cultural scene. 

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley is a Liberian poet, memoirist, writer, professor and human rights activist. She is currently a professor of English, Creative Writing, and African Literature at the Pennsylvania State University.  
Her debut poetry collection, Before the Palm Could Bloom (1998), was followed by Becoming Ebony (2003), which won the Crab Orchard Award. Her latest collection, Praise Song for My Children (2020), won the Theodore Roethke Memorial Poetry Prize.  
Jabbeh Wesley’s poetry deals with themes such as the African Diaspora and hybrid identity, home and displacement, femininity and motherhood. As a survivor of the Liberian civil war, she gives a voice to the voiceless.
Her poems have appeared in Harvard Review, Prairie Schooner, and The New York Times Magazine. She has won the Edward Stanely Poetry Prize and the Levinson Prize. Her work has been translated into several languages, including Spanish, Italian, Finnish, and Hebrew.

Ellen Deckwitz

Ellen Deckwitz is a poet, writer, columnist, and performer with boundless energy and a sharp eye for language and literature. Since her debut The stone fears me (2011), awarded the C. Buddingh’ prize, she has developed into one of the most influential voices in Dutch poetry. She writes columns for NRC and De Morgen, presents poetry slams, and is the co-host of the popular podcast Boeken FM. With bestsellers like Olijven moet je leren lezen, she makes poetry accessible to a wide audience. In 2024, Deckwitz was appointed as the poet laureate of Amsterdam.

Illustration made by Ninthe Kienemeij