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Black and white photo of a boy walking across a littered street, with signs saying ‘No Hang Out Here’ and ‘Keep Away!’. Behind him, a man lies on the ground under a fire escape.

Transcendent experience

idea

Our days are both rough and slippery. Hope brings traction

I want to defend and buoy hope – it’s a fragile, quirky thing, but it has the power to help us act in the face of finitude

by John Lysaker

A man gesticulates and recites poetry at a club event

Poetry

idea

Why spoken word poetry is so much more than a poetry reading

As poetry returns to its roots as a performance art, it’s providing many with a powerful source of healing and community

by Erica Fletcher

Person reading a book inside a bookshop with tall bookshelves filled with various titles, seen through a large window framed by green painted wood.

Stories and literature

idea

Reading books is not just a pleasure: it helps our minds to heal

Through my own struggles and in teaching bibliotherapy to students, I know that books can help to heal minds and hearts

by Peter Leyland

A large spider sculpture with St. Paul’s Cathedral and cranes in the background on a cloudy day in London.

Poetry

idea

A conversation with my spider Maman and Louise Bourgeois

Woman made of braided steel, monster I call Maman: why am I so scared of you? An imagined conversation with Louise Bourgeois

by Pascale Petit

Hands holding an open book with unconventional text layout, words scattered across both pages forming abstract poetry. Dark background, lit by soft light.

Poetry

idea

The long poem is just right for our confounding, fractured age

The long poem is the right literary form for the unmanageable scale, the messy confusion and the epic ambivalence of our age

by Tess Somervell

Two men wearing hats, seated on a kerb, engaged in conversation. One is in overalls, the other in a short-sleeve shirt with suspenders. Background shows a brick building.

Civic life

idea

The power of Langston Hughes’s ‘melancholy citizenship’

Langston Hughes’s poetry offers a guide to the sort of melancholy citizenship that can help us weather democratic heartbreak

by Robert L Tsai

Black and white photograph of Emily Dickinson, inside a red velvet and gold frame.

Poetry

idea

Emily Dickinson and the creative ‘solitude of space’

For the poet Emily Dickinson, sequester was a feminist act of independence: it gave her mental and literal space to write

by Magdalena Ostas

An older woman sings passionately into a microphone; there is a stone statue of historical figures in the background.

Poetry

idea

How poetry casts a spell through the rhythmic magic of metre

Poetry meets the raw needs of our most vulnerable selves in a primal way, with a simple tool: predictable, rhythmic metre

by Annie Finch

Whirling dervishes spinning in traditional white garments with brown hats in a dimly lit setting.

Poetry

idea

Sufi love poetry is in vogue, but few grasp its radical meaning

The Sufi path to love in the poetry of Rumi and ‘Iraqi styles the body as a bridge to the divine in deeply erotic ways

by Matthew Thomas Miller

A painting depicting a human figure, mythical creatures, a large turtle, dragon, snake, and swirling waters.

Poetry

idea

The meaning of cowardly dogs and other puzzles of Arabic poetry

In classical Arabic poetry, beauty and wonder lie in the logical unravelling of a metaphor, rather than plot or character

by Lara Harb

Ancient Greek vase depicting a ship crew, with a man tied to the mast, and winged creatures flying around.

Music

idea

Bach’s piano music is intimate precision and Homeric epic in one

A hero on a journey; a circular movement; a melancholy of homecoming: why Bach is an epic poet in the Homeric tradition

by Dan Moller

Sepia photograph of a man wearing a wide-brimmed hat, a bow tie and a long coat, looking at the camera.

Stories and literature

idea

There is nothing so deep as the gleaming surface of the aphorism

The aphorism has been a way to express strong feelings without placing emotional demands on the listener

by Noreen Masud