Today I am thinking about the connection between poetry and therapy. There are some links below which you can follow on this topic. But just to say I have always valued the way writing poetry can access feelings I am barely aware of and when extracted take me by surprise. The first poem I wrote was an exercise in a creative writing class that required me to describe an object, any object. My target was a wicker plant pot, but as I scribbled on about its fragility and state of disrepair I realised that I was describing my own emotional landscape. Tears ensued.
My early poetic attempts were probably all outpourings from such hidden recesses and my partner would regularly find me in tears by 8am. The suggestion was that I should give it up.
I reassured him that it was healing. He remained sceptical.
However I know that writing poetry has helped me process the many quandaries in my life and I highly recommend it as a way of exploring feelings.
With all of this in mind I did a quick automatic writing exercise and from it emerged a sort of quatrain.
my sleep is fraught because
I have no answers to
the whys, the hows, pourquois, por ques
of you
Tomorrow I hope to develop this into a haibun, a japanese form that mixes autobiographial writing with haiku.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/ie/blog/the-empowerment-diary/202104/the-power-poetry-therapy
http://irishpoetrytherapynetwork.blogspot.com/
Copyright 2022 Cathy Leonard All rights reserved
❤️❤️❤️
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