Representing New York's largest borough, B. Yung's poetry name is short for "Brooklyn's young 'un." In the fifth grade, he was homeless and living in shelters with his Mom. He had his first everything in Brooklyn—first pizza, first basketball game, first fight, first loss and first love. B. Yung describes his time in New York City's Martin Luther King High School like being in a prison, complete with metal detectors, uniforms and a ban on cell phones.

B. started as an aspiring rap artist—always writing and doing raps in the studio. He knew Def Poet Sciryl Cooper had won a poetry slam to make Urban Word's 2005 Brave New Voices Team, so he went to an open mic. He says, "I saw kids 14 and 15 years old ripping it, talking about s*** that I was scared to talk about. So I went up there and spit raps. They loved it, and I was like yo, this is it!"

On the journey to the Brave New Voices festival, B. Yung confronts the challenge of going from solo artist to team player.