oetic healing embraces both the healing power of poetry and the poetic practice of holistic medicine. All healing is a road back home to our original selves. Through technique, medicine provides the structure to help carry us there. Through art, poetry celebrates the beauty of the journey and our constant arrival—an arrival that realizes the road home is home.

         Both poetry and holistic medicine have their origins in a spiritual appreciation of the world. This was the founding vision of traditional medicines realized by the ancient Taoist (Chinese) and Yogic (Indian-Ayurvedic) doctor-mystics thousands of years ago. In both Chinese and Ayurvedic medicines, chants, incantations, poems, hymns, and mantras—all employing the power of the word and the voice—are used as medicine for healing. Tu Fu, perhaps China’s greatest poet ever, used to prescribe poems to his patients for malaria.

         Thousands of miles away in ancient Greece poetry was employed for healing by the priests at the sacred site of Delphi. Pilgrims from all over would come to Delphi for healing. The priests at Delphi would consult Apollo, the god of medicine and poetry, for curative visions. For extra pay, the priests would translate their vision into a poem for the needy. Disease was influenced by the gods, and so illness was not separate from spiritual influences, or the work of poetry.

         “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with G-d, and the word became flesh.” The power of the word began the world and created our bodies. In this sense, we are walking, talking, breathing collections of sacred words. How then could poetry not have some influence on our health, if not our very existence? The truth is, the whole world is poetry (which appears as a collection of nails to the carpenter!) and each of our lives is a poem, which we help shape and are continually shaped by.

         The natural blueprint of holistic healthcare and the creative inspiration of poetry derive from the same source—from the same utterance, from the same breath of G-d. Breath is inspiration and this word originally comes from the Latin, spirare, meaning “vital life force” or “spirit.” Inspirational poetry and the inspired wisdom and intuitions of ancient holistic medicine are both infused with living spirit.

         Both medical technique and the creativity of art support one another in fulfilling our health (a word whose original meaning is “wholeness”). We must breathe deeply the vastness that is life and let it breathe us. Our bodies and souls must be fed. Where medical technique may save lives, art gives saved lives a purpose to live. Either one alone is not enough for us to thrive.

         The purpose of this site and my work as a poet and physician is to nourish our bodies and spirits back to a passionate, grounded, and even eccentric wholeness. This wholeness is our “greater health,” a dynamic and fluid territory where our physical health needs depend upon and help determine the creative purpose for our lives and the wellness of the world around us. Our greater health is discussed at length in my upcoming book, Poetic Healing.

         For much of history, most doctors were artists and many artists were healers. The two disciplines were not so separate as they appear to be today. Poetry is medicine and medicine is poetry. Rich art feeds the body as well as the soul. Wholesome medicine feeds the soul as well as the body. Together, art and medicine help us fulfill our destinies. Enjoy poetic healing…..