8.9.3 Poetry and opposition
Keats (1966) in his poems „Ode on a Grecian Urn‟ and „The Nightingale Ode‟ brings together
the opposites of life and death, joy and sorrow. Hilton (1971) sees the melancholy of Keats
poems as:
“not just a „fit‟, nor is it a mood, but rather a state of mind in which these opposites
may be brought together” (Hilton 1971:106).
Poets throughout history to the modern day bring opposites together in their work. It seems that
the reflexive space provided by writing enables poets to achieve this melancholic state of mind
which encourages the possibility of exploring opposites. The participants seem to demonstrate
this state of mind in their journals as they bring opposites together. Wriggling Fish tends to
demonstrate opposition in many entries but in entry twelve there is opposition in just a few lines:
Extract 54. From WF journal to show opposition
Line 1.
Week „off‟ - glad.
Line 2.
Neck pain, confined!
Line 3.
Cannot drive.
Line 4.
Turmoil / emotional
Line 5.
New Zealand and life calling!
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Although she is glad at the beginning because she has a week off from counselling the next three
lines are about pain, her inability to drive and emotional turmoil. This gives the impression of a
distressed or unhappy way of being, yet in the last line she seems full of optimism and the
adventure of life. There is discomfort felt in the opposition as if the entry does not make sense.
But perhaps it can be understood by her forthcoming move to another country. This may be what
she wants in her external life, but perhaps she also wants to move this much internally, to get rid
of the restrictive neck pain and find the freedom of her own feelings.
Alice has several entries which show opposition and seem to embody her sadness but also her
desire for change. It seems that feeling opposition in the world and in herself enables her to learn
about herself:
Extract 55. From A journal to show opposition
Line 1.
Sea Saw
Line 2.
Want what I can‟t have,
Line 3.
don‟t want it when I can have it.
Line 4.
Control and out of control
Line 5.
How to find the right balance?
Line 6.
Got to know plant
Line 7.
Feel I‟m getting closer.
There is a real sense of the up and down movement of the sea saw, the swing between opposite
desires. Feeling and being aware of internal opposition seems to make her wonder about finding
the right balance. This appears to take her away from the movement for balance may be seen as
being still. She goes further away by writing about a plant that was in the counselling room but
ends up feeling she is getting closer, perhaps to herself. But the real movement of the entry
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seems to be in the first four lines and this is what opposition, with its melancholy, seems to give
to the process of exploring the self.
Turned On moves in her journal between feeling confused and feeling that her thoughts get
clearer. In the first five lines of her first entry she shows this confusion:
Extract 56. From TO journal to show opposition
Lin1 1.
This seemed to be a very
Line 2.
confused session for me
Line 3.
today back into deep family
Line 4.
difficulties and feel not
Line 5.
worthy. Have to prove myself
She seems to have returned to a place that she has been before, deep into family difficulties
which appear to make her feel unworthy. Yet immediately afterwards it seems she has to prove
herself which feels the opposite of being unworthy. She berates herself regularly through the
journal and appears to be seeking to like/love herself and these opposing states seems to help her
move emotionally. But there is always the feeling of melancholy with such opposing feelings as
she finds a state of mind that enables such opposition to be felt.
Little Girl seems to see herself as a little girl when she writes out the childhood rhyme „There
was a little girl‟. Yet in week seventeen she declares „I am not Bambi‟ as if she is saying the
opposite. This moving between feeling very young and very grown up is a constant part of her
journal. She is so very grown up in the way she writes with such accomplishment that opposition
feels inherent throughout the journal. In week eight she writes:
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Extract 57. From LG journal to show inherent opposition
Line 1. SO MANY WORDS
Line 2. BUT NOTHING TO SAY
Line 3. AS IF
Line 4. BY TALKING
Line 5. YOU CAN HIDE
Line 6. WHAT IS REAL.
It seems that there have been many words in the counselling session yet she feels that nothing
has been said. The opposition here feels encased in sadness for the talking seems to hide what is
real as if her reality has been hidden by all the words. Her reality feels hidden here and yet so
present in the embodied sadness.
Opposition in the journal of Who Am I seems hidden yet it is felt. It is particularly felt in the
sadness or melancholy of her entries:
Extract 58. From WAI journal to show melancholy
Line 1.
Tired, exhausted, virus.
Line 2.
Irritable bowel playing up,
Line 3.
tension + stress
shoulder, neck
Line 4.
pain.
Line 5.
Feel want to be left alone to
Line 6.
do nothing.
Here she seems to state very clearly that her physical body is holding her feelings. She wants to
be left alone to do nothing, yet she does not leave herself alone for she still writes which is doing
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something as opposed to nothing.
If Hilton (1971) is correct and it is a melancholic state of mind that enables opposition to come
into focus for the creative writer, then it makes sense of my writing following trauma and the
sadness I felt when analysing the journals. It was embodied within me, just as it is in the journal
writers.
8.10 Conclusion
The participants‟ journals exceeded all my expectations and provided a wealth of material that
even now seems only partially used for the study. There is so much that may be linked to
counselling theory and poetry that I feel as if I have only scratched the surface of all that may be
embodied in the narratives. However the fact that established theory appears to be visible in the
journals does confirm that theory may be deduced from the client‟s perspective. The journals
also seem to provide a way of looking at the process of internal growth from object relations
through the restoration of the self to a more modern view of multiple selves. The similarities
between the poetic space and the counselling space where the individual/client may discover a
safe place where the unconscious may emerge is intriguing. It makes sense of my desire to
enable the participants to use poetic skills without actually asking them to write poetry.
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