The Poetics of Crisis: Poets in Dialogue
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The Poetics of Crisis: Poets in Dialogue Jamie K. Reaser1,2,3 · J. Drew Lanham4 · Theodore Richards5 Received: 22 July 2020 / Revised: 7 September 2020 / Accepted: 1 October 2020 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract As part of the American University in Paris’ 2020 Conference on the Psychology of Global Crises, we collaborated in a panel discussion entitled the Poetics of Crisis in which we explored the role of poetry as a medium of personal and transpersonal expression during times of crisis, as well as a means for transmuting crisis into an opportunity, a platform, for generative change. Here, we continue the dialogue, three award-winning poets exploring how words—through our own approach to literary writing—can invoke human potential during challenging times. We reflect on poetry in form, as an offering to and conveyance of beauty amidst pain, as protest in the way that it can demarcate what no longer serves sentiment and survival, and as a spark of revolution—the inspiration and guide when the necessary changes are called out and called up for the sake of humanity. We conclude with a poetic invitation. Keywords Crisis · Poetry · Conversation · Beauty · Revolution
Introduction “Poetry offers psychology its own perspective on the reaches of the realm, a unique repository not only of energy, but also of imagery, metaphor, paradox, inversion, contradiction, and often enough beauty. Poetry valorizes and embraces the resources of the unconscious.” (Akhter, 2013). Prominent psychologists have unabashedly, and with great reverence, recognized poetry as portal into the subconscious. Carl Jung, for example, notes that “the poet who responds to the prompting of the unconscious is able to tap deep emotional sources” (Jung, 2015). In this light, he may have regarded poets as a type of well-travelled depth * Jamie K. Reaser [email protected] 1
Giving Voice to Resilience LLC, VA, Stanardsville, USA
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Department of Environmental Science and Policy, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA
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Department of Natural Resources, University of Rhode Island, RI, Providence, USA
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Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation, Clemson University, SC, Clemson, USA
5
Chicago Wisdom Project, Chicago, IL, USA
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psychologist—aeronauts of the underworld. Robert Romanyshyn (2007) acknowledges poetry as an expression, an art, of the soul. He regards psychologists, seemingly with a sense of exasperation, as “failed poets” for a lack of ability to fully bridge the gap between the conscious and unconscious minds, as is the natural aptitude of poets. His overarching message seems to be that an inability to bridge this gap limits the psychologist’s ability to discern the key momentary truths, and thus, he urges modern psychologists to “keep the soul in mind” in order to hone their aptitudes for sensibility towards that of a poet. Wachs (2011) explores psychology’s need for poetry, concluding that poetry is a means by which a person can become sensible through the disco
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