Poetry and the right brain

Poetry presents a rare point of view to the world: the poet presents the world as filtered through the right side of the brain. I think this is an interesting way of determining what is the essential element that qualifies a collection of words to be considered a poem. I note that writers often place words into what looks like verse, but does not strike me as a poem because it is all left brain observation--in essence, pragmatic fact.

This point was brought home to me in an interview on CBC Radio One today (December 6, 2009). In it, Dr. Taylor described how, in the hospital after her stroke, which cut off her access to the left side of her brain for a time, she can recall not having any facts: she did not recognize her mother: her mother's name is Gigi; when she heard Gigi was coming to visit her, she wondered what a Gigi was. When her mother arrived, and cuddled her, she thought, delighted, "Ah, so this is what a Gigi is!" Her mother, arriving to see her twenty-seven year old daughter curled up in a fetal position in the hospital bed, instinctively realized that she needed to be held.

As I listened to the broadcast, I realized that What I do when I write poetry is to filter reality through the right side of my brain. I also realized that this is what makes poetry unique and significant for human experience: while most writing is filtered through the left side of the brain exclusively, it is poetry that takes language through the other, more intuitive route.

As one of the participants in the Zeugma Poetry Forum recently said in a thread: you may have to trick your ego (in essence, your chosiste left brain).

I think this is an idea worth exploring.

Podcast of Mary Hynes's interview with Dr. Taylor is the Tapestry program of December 6, 2009: Interview with Jill Bolt Taylor

Dr. Taylor has also written a book: My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey