Poet Ashley Gonzalez, 18, is a senior at Northside College Prep.  This is the second year she has represented her school at Louder Than a Bomb, which advanced to the Final round of competition in the 2012 Festival. 

51 Stars is an intense look at collonialism in Puerto Rico, calling out the United States for the way the island - both its people and its land - has been treated.

Though everyone knows “the points are not the point, the point is the poetry” – congratulations to Ashley, who successfully advanced to the Final round of competition, one of the top 13 individual poets in the 2012 Festival, out of a field of over 800 young writers.

The largest of its kind in the world, Louder Than A Bomb (LTAB) is Chicago’s rapidly-growing teen poetry festival, taking place February 18 - March 10, 2012, at various venues around Chicago. Aiming to bring teens together across racial, gang, and socio-economic lines, LTAB is a friendly competition that emphasizes self-expression and community via poetry, oral story-telling, and hip-hop spoken word.

Click here to hear all the other 2012 recordings, alongside nearly 200 Louder Than a Bomb Finalist pieces recorded by Chicago Public Media (WBEZ-Chicago) over the past eight years.