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Healing Through Poetry
There is nothing more genuine, raw, and eloquent than a poem.
I cannot recount the times I turned to written words to save me from despair.
The words of poets who have walked the steps I’m walking now are like a warm embrace after a long journey. Life may be bad at times but it’s not always a catastrophe.
In the face of adversity, I recall Viktor Frankl in “Man’s Search for Meaning” whose entire family perished in concentration camps. Though the thought of suicide crossed his mind, he promised himself he will never ‘run into the wire’ or touch the electrically-charged barbed-wire fence.
How does one remain collected when you are standing too close to death?
Under the spell of lasting love, there is “Decade” by Amy Lowell, a poem that speaks of a decision a lover or a partner makes repeatedly to be with the same person:
When you came, you were like red wine and honey,
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with its sweetness.
Now you are like morning bread,
Smooth and pleasant.
I hardly taste you at all for I know your savour,
But I am completely nourished.
