Poets in conversation about the healing power of poetry.
The first episode begins with an introduction by our host Sukanya about the initiative called Kaavya Cure. She states that the basic idea behind this initiative is to propagate the healing power of poetry. Her research on the topic led her to write an article about it and also inspired her to start a channel on Mentza and ask her fellow poets to share insights on this aspect of poetry. She mentions that poetry is definitely a medium of expression and entertainment but beyond that studies have shown that there is a certain healing power in poetry which is such that it has cured many serious diseases. She adds that it is known to provide comfort and boost mood during periods of stress, trauma, and grief.
Sukanya then goes on to introduce M Lakshmi Supriya. She is an Instapoet and her pen name is Spear. She writes poetry and prose as a reflection of her own true self and is also a self-published author of "Musings by a SPEARHEAD". They both have also written a book together called "Petals and Thorns".
M Lakshmi Supriya calls herself a confessional poet. She likes to portray what she observes through words and poetry. She has written more than four hundred poems and counting over ten years and is currently working on a new manuscript. She started writing poems when she was 15 years old. Initially, she wrote poems about her parents and mother nature. She realized that she had a penchant for writing during her first year as an architecture student. She also realized then that her poems in school did not have much of a structure or narrative and that her poems as an architecture student had a very vulnerable angle to them when she resumed writing in college. One thing that set her poems apart is that they have an angle of healing and recovery to them, how she views the world from a solitary perspective, and also on mental health which was always perceived as a taboo. That is when she became very emotive with her poems and also gave her a boost to write her debut book, which she maintains will be her most prized possession. The best part about writing is that it feels real and you don't have to seek any validation from anyone and what you write is what you feel. She believes that writing about something that you are going through helps you to emerge through it better. She is also a Mandala artist and states that Mandala is another dimension of healing for her but poetry has always been her first resort. Her poems are freestyle and non-structured but highly confessional. She recommends that people should write if they have no one else to confide in and it will help them through the given situation better. As she wrote her confessional poems, she realized that she was finding the solution to her own problems. She sensed that as she kept on writing, her mental strength also grew along with it and pushed her to push forward in life. The truth is that we all go through something and for each of us the fight is unique, and the struggle is different, and how we seek to find solutions to our fight is also unique. She goes on to say that she bled poetry and went on to a peak of writing five or six poems a day and even writing five to six paragraphs of prose a day. She just kept on writing a poem until she was exhausted and until she believed that it is over creatively. The best feeling a poet or a writer can get is to be heard through their poems or words, which is such a precious feeling. She enamored her writing and felt that it was a way of returning to her full strength to face the world head-on.
Sukanya chimes in to say that poetry is such a personal experience and when we do some inner work we do not have some tangible thing to go back to but writing poems means that there is always something that you can revisit all the time. When one is dealing with the death of a loved one, as Sukanya had experienced her grandfather's death (it was the first death in her family that she had experienced), then poetry helped her to cope with the sense of loss that she felt.
Sukanya opens that floor for questions and a guy named Dheeraj joins the conversation agreeing to the healing power of poetry as detailed by Sukanya and M Lakshmi Supriya. He says that poetry has the power to heal all kinds of grief in life. He also shared something with everyone that he had written on April 1st, 2015 and you all should listen in to the episode to hear his beautifully written poem. He further mentioned that we are all lost in our own solitude and we all should pen our thoughts on paper to dignify our thoughts.
Sukanya further asks which is better: whether the kind of work one produces when one is emotionally sober versus the kind of work that one produces when one is with the intent of healing or in a very emotional state. She feels that the latter is better. M Lakshmi Supriya answers that she was creating an alter ego through her poems. Her spirit was guiding her lower form into a higher state of mindfulness and guiding her through thick and thin and the best part was to respond to different feelings through her poetry but if she had to answer this question, she says that her poems were on survival when she was feeling low. She says that she surprises herself with the kind of poetry that she writes at times. Dheeraj joins in to say that he agrees with the speakers and that the poetry he produces when in an emotional frame of mind (happy, sad, or otherwise) is much better.
And on this note, the circle is closed. Readers, please click on the transcription of episode 2 to read about the healing power of poetry from our guests, Samridhi Aneja & Vachaknavi Sarma.
M Lakshmi Supriya is an Instapoet going by the nom de plume, Spear on her Instagram handle @thespearheadpoet. She writes poetry and prose, as a reflection of her own true feelings and self and loves to experiment with writings under diversified themes. To her, writing is sunshine to the self. She became a self-published author by releasing her debut poetry collection titled "Musings by a SPEARHEAD" that focuses on themes of Alone rants, Romance, Survival, and Recovery. She is a hardcore music buff, an avid reader, and a sincere foodie who has a curiosity to learn new things every day.
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