‘The Living Poetry Project is part of UNSW’s lived experience storytelling project Untold Stories…’ Photo: Supplied.
“Poetry is a very vulnerable art form and has so much power to help us touch our emotional world and find words for what so often goes unspoken. It’s also a powerful reflective tool. When a poem touches us and we feel ‘I know that feeling too’, we may all of a sudden understand ourselves in a new way and also feel less alone in our mad world. Poetry is a powerful healing,” says trauma-informed educator and poet Natalia Rachel.
The rise of poetry as a tool for emotional healing and self-expression is becoming more prevalent, particularly among Gen Z as they struggle to find ways of navigating the intersections of relationships, trauma and modern love.
Thuy On is the former Reviews and Literary Editor of ArtsHub and an arts journalist, critic and poet who’s written for a range of publications including The Guardian, The Saturday Paper, Sydney Review of Books, The Australian, The Age/SMH and Australian Book Review. She was the Books Editor of The Big Issue for 8 years and a former Melbourne theatre critic correspondent for The Australian.
She has three collections of poetry published by the University of Western Australian Press (UWAP): Turbulence (2020), Decadence (2022) and Essence (2025).
Threads: @thuy_on123 Instagram: poemsbythuy
