The Poetry Cure by Julia Darling and Cynthia Fuller (eds)

The Poetry Cure

Julia Darling and Cynthia Fuller (eds)

A collection of poems for people who are ill and the the ones they love. The introduction says 'By giving us words, poetry can help cure us' - and this is an attempt to give the sick a voice and find some kind of order from the chaos of ill health. The insight into how it feels to be ill is very revealing but, for me, the collection came over as serious rather than comforting.

Extract
Daydreaming comes easy to the ill:
slowed down to the speed of waiting rooms, you learn to hang suspended in wallpaper, to drift among the magazines and plants,
feeling a strange love
for the time that might be killing you.
from Medicine by Tony Hoagland
Parallels
  • No Can Do by Julie O'Callaghan
  • East of the Mountains by David Guterson
  • Sudden Collapses in Public Places by Julia Darling

Late night blues