Poetry Therapy.

Poetry therapy is the method of therapy based on the principle that a poem is a special medium for expressing emotions and that this expression can have psychotherapeutic value. A survey taken in 1973 showed there were over 400 therapists treating 3,500 drug addicts, alcoholics, and mental retardates around the country. Poetry therapists discourage their pupils from overconcern with stylistics which engender a sense of artificial double think; they make great use of the fact that we are symbolic beings, capable of emotionally understanding far more than words alone can communicate. At present, there are four ways to run a therapy session: (1) provide group members with varied poetry selections to read and respond to, (2) provide members with poems of a similar mood or topic, (3) have members write poetry round robin style, and (4) have members write and react to each other's work of original poetry written during the session. Poetry therapy can also be used in the English program classroom as a way to reach disadvantaged students, as a means of promoting a better communication between upper grade students and lower grade students, as an extracurricular activity, and as an extremely humanistic method of getting into the study of poetry. (TS)