Pencil This In

FINALS: Today the NY Times looks inside the Knicks Poetry Slam Finals. The paper describes the event: "In their search for identity and their quest to be understood, the teenagers mold metaphors from their jagged-edge experiences and bend rhymes to their own rhythm." Tonight the finalists get their last shot at over $30,000 in prizes (including a scholarship).

7 p.m. // The Grand Ballroom, Manhattan Center // Free

EVENT: Big Noise is back from Iraq and ready to show their new short films from the front lines. "What kind of occupation has Obama inherited, and how can we end the war in Iraq? Obama's Iraq is an evening of short films never before seen in America. Shot on the other side of the blast shields in Iraq's walled cities, it covers a side of the war that is rarely seen on American screens. It reports unembedded from war-torn Falluja, from the giant US prison at Umm Qasr, from the Mehdi Army stronghold inside Sadr City—from the places where mainstream corporate channels can not or will not go." Also expect discussion with Big Noise and other participants.

7:30 p.m. // Anthology Film Archives [32 2nd Ave] // $8

THEATER: We've made no secret of our love for Richard Foreman's Ontological-Hysteric theater, and why should we? His annual extravaganza at the intimate theater at St. Mark's Church is one of the things that gets us through the winter. This year's adventure, Astronome: A Night at the Opera, is his most dynamic production in recent years, and you'd be a fool to miss it. A collaboration with avant-garde composer John Zorn, the non-narrative spectacle is a taut hour of ritualistic frenzy, as funny as it is hypnotic. (Our full review is here.) Tonight's performance will be followed by what's sure to be an interesting conversation between Foreman and playwright Young Jean Lee, whose play The Argument was a recent hit at The Kitchen. — John Del Signore

8 p.m. // Ontological Theater at St. Mark's Church [131 East 10th Street] // $25

MUSIC: NYC band Pela returns tonight from...wherever they have been, playing a late show at Mercury Lounge with River City Extension. (They both return next Tuesday, along with Holly Miranda and Neckbeard Telecaster.)

9:30 p.m. // Mercury Lounge [217 E Houston St] // $12