Languid branches above, cool air below, A path in the forest – so much to know… Ageless trees growing to the sky, You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply, You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply… Unshackled, his soul struggled to find any grounding limits. His mind became filled […]
March 21 is World Poetry Day. On the UNESCO website for the day, poetry is described as a vitally important and universal form of cultural expression: “Practiced throughout history – in every culture and on every continent – poetry speaks to our common humanity and our shared values, transforming the simplest of poems into a […]
Poet’s Corner is an organic grouping of ISSTD members who share with each other poems that they have created, and which frequently encompass themes related to member’s work as trauma-informed therapists. On occasions the group come together for online recitals to share such productions with the wider ISSTD community. These poems then become available for […]
not yet knowing where your body endsand mine begins, I need your playto make amendsto re-pair our self-fractured dividends again, I listen to your curative narrative I insert myself between your gestured silenceto relive shared stresses, endless violence within and without, we’re urgently buffeted between unspoken sensationsor floundering in each other’s treacherous privations eventually we […]
The drummers drum and the writers scroll, We avert our gaze, yet risk our soul… Humanity owns the rising toll… Our leaders lament, as poets search for the words that fit… A silent crime, but no one murmurs, for truth is split… Yet buried in the far corners of hidden shame, It is the fragile […]
Show me a story without lossand one which deals with pride without the cautiousnessof shame. Rich with poverty she could not recall her life before high school. On Sundays the church bellsregistered the pain of the sinners,those blameless children, fondled by cherish leaders,they could not evade the punishment they proposed. In therapy,unfolding the secret of the past,her origami […]
As many of you will know by now, ISSTD’s very own poetry group – ‘Poet’s Corner’ provided a fantastic presentation as part of the Asia-Pacific Regional Conference in November 2021. This year, each month in ISSTD News, we have been publishing those poems for your enjoyment. This is the last of that installment, but we […]
“He’s not cooperative,” his teacher warned me when I called to find out more about the boy who’d been referred to me for speech-language therapy. “He’ll find a hundred excuses to not do the work.” “Sounds creative,” I interjected. “He is,” the teacher conceded, “but it is exhausting.” For him, too, I was sure. “You’d […]
March 20 is World Poetry Day and this month we bring you a very topical poem by Warwick Middleton, which illustrates the way poetry can be used to explore both past and contemporary traumas. Joseph the priest, Adolf the painter and Vladimir, the spy, Humanity weeps and seeks to question – the how and the why…They […]
This article has been previously published in California Association of Marriage and Family Therapy magazine, The Therapist, and is reprinted here with permission of the authors, Perie Longo, MFT, and Phyllis Klein, LCSW From the beginning of time, poetry has been a means for people to express their deepest emotions and create healing in ritual and ceremony. […]
