Nothing speaks louder than a poem made from the heart. Junior Isaiah Carrasquillo created a poem and competed against many other schools for this year’s Louder Than A Bomb competition. Carrasquillo ended up placing as a Quarter Finalist and moved on to compete in Semi Finals. He was the first person at Phoenix to compete in the Semi Finals within his first year.  

Carrasquillo didn’t originally write his poem about being biracial for the competition. In fact, he was inspired to write this poem thanks to one of his teachers.

“I was influenced by Mr. Faloona who told me to write a Black History Month rap and it turned into a poem,” said Carrasquillo

Since his performance at the Black History Month celebration, Carrasquillo has made some minor changes to the poem and prepped it to be a piece that he later used to compete in the LTAB competitions.

With the lights flashing and the crowds cheering Carrasquillo’s anxiety rose, but he didn’t let that get in the way.

“I was nervous because it was our team’s first year; every single one of us, and I had to take the lead and put my nerves behind me,” said Carrasquillo.

Becoming a semi finalists wasn’t easy, and it wasn’t something that could be done alone.

“What got me so far was definitely the help of Mr. Waller, Mr. Faloona, and my team’s support,” said Carasquillo.