By Michael Adkison
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Twenty-nine days of the month, Houston Hughes doesn’t do much.
“I don’t have a lot of consistency,” he said. “I run a YouTube channel called ArkanSense.”
But on that thirtieth day, he lets loose, because Houston is the emcee of Last Saturday Fayetteville, a slam poetry variety show held on the last Saturday of every month.
Last Saturday began nearly seven years ago in the Fayetteville Underground Art gallery. Now, through donations and a dedicated fanbase, the event moved to the larger American Legion Post in east Fayetteville.
The event consists of local artists all performing with a limited amount of time to showcase their talents in front of an audience, who is tasked with judging the performances on a 10-point scale.
“You can do just about anything as long as you do it with your body and you made it up yourself,” Hughes said.
But Last Saturday became more than just entertainment along the way. For the many returning performers and audience members, it’s become a family.
“Last Saturday is a home for people who have something to say,” manager Madeleine Applegate said. “We never censor anything you have to say.”
Hughes says that Last Saturday is a sanctuary for creative minds, a vision he saw many years ago when he moved to Fayetteville.
“It’s really important to me to have a space where people can find their voices,” Hughes said. “That’s what slam did for me when I was in college.”
After discovering slam poetry, Hughes began traveling across the country and said Fayetteville poetry slam “needed to move in some new directions,” and he created Last Saturday Fayetteville.
The event is free and open to the public, and their next show is on Saturday, October 26. Hughes says that this upcoming show will be a “cover slam,” meaning performers can showcase work from other artists, performers, or writers.