El Camino College celebrated National Poetry Month by hosting its second Slam Poetry Competition in the Distance Education Building on Thursday, April 26.

“April is the month that the nation celebrates poetry,” Analu Cruz-Josephides, Assistant Professor Reference Librarian said. “I’m hoping that we as a committee agree upon making this an annual event.”

The poems at the event varied from talks about the annoyance of one’s grammar to social injustices and experiences with sexual assault.

“We don’t understand how sexual assault affects men especially gay men,” Damon Lawson, 20, education major said.

Lawson who won second place hopes to shine a light on the effects of sexual assault on gay men.

“According to the Human Rights campaign gay men are assaulted 30 percent more than any other demographic,” Lawson said. “But only five percent of us ever talk out about it because of the repercussions of speaking out about it.”

This years first place winner Avion Warner spoke on the struggles of being black in current-day America.

“It’s kind of sketchy for me to walk down the streets and have police looking at me and I see them look at me the whole [time], and it irritates my soul,” Warner, 18, psychology major, said. “It wasn’t a hate poem, it was just more of a social injustice for all races.”

He hopes that people hearing his poem will take peace and positivity from his words.

“I hope people take the truth and vision, the reality of America and how cruel it could be,” Warner said. “America is still beautiful, but there are a lot of injustices that we have to work on as human beings.”