SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Pennsylvania poet Taryn Pratzner and Yellowknife standup comic Lauren Froment are going to crash the weekly music jam at Javaroma tomorrow night.

The pair encourage other poets, writers, comics and musicians to join them from 7 p.m. until 10 p.m. at the popular all-ages night spot.

Poet Taryn Pratzner, left, and comic Lauren Froment are plotting to crash the Saturday night jam at Java Roma with some spoken word performances. They encourage other spoken word artists and musicians of all ages to join them for words, music, coffee and Pepsi from 7 p.m. until 10 p.m. tomorrow. - Daron Letts/NNSL photo

"I'd love to see what Yellowknife has to offer as far as talent young and old," Pratzner said.

"I don't think anybody should be discouraged from expressing themselves."

Pratzner is in Yellowknife on an internship with the Emergency Shelter for Women, where this month she is helping to organize a fundraiser for the Centre for Northern Families to be held in front of the Mini Golf Course on Aug. 17.

She heads back home to Kutztown, Pennsylvania, which is the hometown of the late artist and social activist Keith Haring, later this month.

She plans to come back to Yellowknife next spring to encourage more spoken word events.

"The idea I have for a program I'd like to start up upon my return would be to incorporate storytelling into some of the programs at the women's shelter," she said.

"Storytelling is a universal thing that's prevalent in a lot of aboriginal cultures. It's a good way to communicate different emotions, not necessarily through flat-out telling them but through metaphors and symbolism and just through telling about life in a different way.

"It's a positive way to express yourself."

Pratzner embraced spoken word performance as a teenager, first writing in her journal and then sharing her words publicly as part of a high school poetry club.

As an adult she joined a spoken word group that organized events around her county and promoted independent publishing.

The group built up enough energy and commitment to hold poetry readings every day during National Poetry Month in April.

"We just gave people a place where they could gather and share the different things they were doing," she said.

"Spoken word is a positive outlet for people to express themselves and it's a good social outlet, too."

Tomorrow night Pratzner will present some fresh material that addresses Northern themes from an American perspective.

Froment will deliver her unique style of taboo-bending comedy.