Poetry has never been more important. In turbulent times like these, it is natural to search for reliable sources of truth. But where do we find what can seem so illusive?

Does it come through the ever-increasing number of chattering channels, each competing to be heard in the swelling volume of contradictory news? Or through inherited wisdom and knowledge passed down through small family units, as we spread ever further from our roots?

Perhaps we need to look elsewhere. To a timeless source of truth that always speaks from its time to the present moment. Something not based on a need for popularity, specific geography or instantaneous praise.

Poetry is something we can inherit; a lineage of wisdom extending backward from today. And in it you find an understanding of experiences that seem unfathomable to our own, current perception of life.

From beginners learning to write poetry to seasoned wordsmiths, all writers reveal themselves as individuals in their poetry even if we have always known them as icons or foreign others. They reveal an innocence and honesty in their desires and hopes; empathy and anger in their griefs and despairs. It reveals the writer as a human, as an individual – one willing speak out and reveal some part of themselves.

Poetry denies us the chance to dismiss any writer as illegitimate in their depiction of life. After all it is theirs they are telling, and in their telling is revealed some truth of their experience. It brings their conversation into our own and in doing so expands each of us.

But what else does poetry do? Poetry communicates meaning beyond facts; it connects people through shared experience or empathy; and crucially, it slows us down. To read a poem is not a quick thought, something to skim read and move on from, unmoved. It demands our attention. It asks us to step back and reflect; to empathise with some other perspective on reality.

And in this slowing down we invite ourselves into a further understanding of a situation: drawing new conclusions, asking new questions, finding new voice. We live in a time when so many voices are heard speaking, yet so few are actually heard. Poetry is our necessary counter to all this.
But poetry is not something only for those who are wiser or better than us.

Poetry is for everyone and everyone has access to it. And that means not only reading poetry, but writing it; discovering and cultivating your own voice. Writing the words that will slow others down into an understanding of your experience of this life.

By:Melvey koka (the surgical poet)
@Copyright reserved
Sonador (the dreamer)
© Melvey koka