Therapeutic Poems for Advancing Coping, Empathy, and Cultural Well-Being

Abstract

From the perspective of poetry therapy, the author relates Western views of poetic time, rhythm, literary creation, and metaphoric language to ancient Chinese conceptions of literature and to the haiku tradition. The author analyzes and develops practical approaches to using haiku for therapeutic, rehabilitative, and preventive purposes. In haikus, he detects potential to explorative and meditative self- and communal transformation, flexible coping with current anxieties, and the advancement of social and cultural well-being. The ecopoetic applications of haiku pave way to more empathic connections of human beings to nature and the whole cosmos.

Keywords

• haiku
• poetry therapy
• coping
• metaphors
• nature writing
• empathy