Healing through Poetry - 8th Annual Conference

HEALING THROUGH POETRY -

 8^th Annual Conference         

Saturday 12^th October 2019 

9.15-5.00pm

This year, IPTN’s Conference takes place in Belfast

Join us for a day of personal development through the worlds of poetry and creativity. Qualified and experienced facilitators working in Ireland and the USA will lead these experiential sessions. No writing experience is necessary and work will not be critiqued.

Key Speaker

We are delighted to welcome award-winning poet Paula Cunningham, who will explore the theme of ‘Uses of Constraint’. Paula’s session will begin with a short reading from her work, followed by a reflection on Auden’s famous statement: Poetry makes nothing happen. We will participate in a creative activity with the possibility of drafting a poem.

Bio:

Paula Cunningham was born in Omagh and lives in Belfast. Her pamphlet A Dog called Chance was a winner in The Poetry Business Competition. Paula’s book Heimlich's Manoeuvre was shortlisted for the Fenton-Aldeburgh, Seamus Heaney Centre, and Strong Shine First Collection Prizes. Paula’s poems have been widely anthologised in Ireland and beyond, appearing in The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing Vol. 5, d The New Irish Poets and Best British Poetry (201).  In 2011 she won the Hippocrates Poetry Prize (NHS section) and was shortlisted in the Edwin Morgan Prize. Paula has also written plays for Tinderbox and BBC Radio 4, and a short story appeared in Faber’s Best New Irish Short Stories 2004-5. In May 2019, Paula gave a poetry reading at the10th Hippocrates Conference on Poetry and Medicine and Hippocrates Awards, Newcastle, UK. Paula currently holds an award from the Arts Council of NI.

CONFERENCE DETAILS 

Venue:  Wellington Park Hotel, 21 Malone Rd, Belfast BT9 6RU

Date: Saturday 12^th October 2019

Fee :  €65  (IPTN & Lapidus members)        

          €85 Non-members (please note that if membership fees are paid at the same time as the conference fees, the lower rate will apply)

Membership fees: €15 due September
     
Fees payable in € to Irish Poetry Therapy Network

Conference fees and membership fees may be paid electronically.

Please put your name on the payment reference

Permanent TSB

Account number: 86899860

Sort code: 990643

IBAN: IE90IPBS99064386899860

Enquiries and cheques in € to:
Bernie Walsh, Treasurer IPTN,
60 Hazelwood, Gorey,
Co. Wexford,
Ireland.

Places are limited, so to ensure you will not be disappointed, please reserve your place by emailing  irishpoetrytherapynetwork@gmail.com

Meals available from the hotel

HOTEL  ACCOMMODATION

The hotel is holding some bedrooms available for conference delegates for 11/10/2019.  

The price per single is £75.00 B&B and double or twin will be £95.00

Guests can book their room by either calling or emailing reservations quoting block code IPTN111019. The hotel requires a credit or debit card from guests at the time of booking for guarantee.

Any rooms not booked from the allocation block by 13.09.19 will automatically be released – any booking after this date will be subject to availability.

https://www.wellingtonparkhotel.com/

IPTN AGM

IPTN's Annual General Meeting will be held in Dublin on Saturday 22nd June 2019 at 11am in the Spensor Hotel, on North Wall Quay.
A Peer Group session is planned for after the meeting.

All welcome to attend.

IPTN Journal vol 4 issue 1 Spring 2019

Writing For Wellness - Group Poem

This is the group's first attempt at a group poem following the first day of Writing For Wellness:

Poems like birds flying around the world
I have never had the patience for knots
the muscle of broken words engulfed
in misunderstandings
warm to my good nature
to self-sabotage and self-flagellate
praising dandelion petals comes easy
when I learn to be.

How long does the tide take to transform glass
the inner grain of gold
the gold is deep within
from the silence comes a cacophony of wisdom
the complex whole, the wet mass of veins
verbs, nerves, brain cells, words
rhythmic crescendo lusty in gale
she's just responding to the signals from the deep
greedy satiated.

Be a tree, remember your sapling days
being grateful
letting go is the hardest
accept difficulty and change is essential for growth
enjoy the gifts of the sensual world.

Writing for Wellness Conference

We are delighted to announce that IPTN 7th annual conference, in collaboration with iaPoetry and Lapidus International, has been a resounding success. A full report on the conference will be published in our next Poetry Therapy Journal and, in the meantime, here is the first of our group poems composed over the weekend.

A group poem is one written by each participant adding a line on the spot, as they feel moved to do so.

Not of the wild sea

Into the blue, blue of the ocean
where the gardens are lush and
the trees sag with mango
my dyspraxic hands fumble
crushing the fragile fruit
I watch with my dream eye
and the world is drowned in tears
for our joy is but one
massaging out the unwanted
like time within a dream
you need to finish out your song
where half-written works of art are complete
the wish-keeper they called me
this is the saddest kiss
I sit here on my patchwork cushion
and float skywards
igniting spider web.

Poetry Therapy Ezine Autumn 2018

7th Annual Conference: Writing For Wellness: Accentuate the Positive

Irish Poetry Therapy Network

7^th Annual Conference

in collaboration with

Lapidus International and

iaPOETRY 

This year, IPTN’s Conference is in collaboration with Lapidus International and International Academy for Poetry Therapy. These two international organisations will bring their experience of writing for well-being to Ireland for, what promises to be, an innovative and exciting weekend.  

Writing for Wellness: Accentuate the Positive    

Join us on a weekend of personal development through the inner world of dreams, poetry, and oral and written story-telling.

Qualified and experienced facilitators working in Ireland, UK and Wales will lead these experiential sessions. No writing experience is necessary and work will not be critiqued.

Mike Hackett

Key Speaker

We are delighted to welcome Mike Hackett, psychotherapist and oneironaut (dream traveller). Facilitator of the Dublin Dream Appreciation Group, he is also a member and patron of the International Association for the Study of Dreams.

Venue: Ashdown Park Hotel, Gorey, Co. Wexford, Ireland

http://www.ashdownparkhotel.com/

Date: Weekend 13/14 October 2018

Fee : €70 per day (€60 IPTN & Lapidus members)        
        €120 weekend (€100 IPTN & Lapidus members)                                           Meals can be purchased in the hotel 

Fees payable in € to Irish Poetry Therapy Network by cheque or P.O. 
and posted to:
Bernie Walsh, Treasurer IPTN, 
60 Hazelwood, Gorey, 
Co. Wexford, 
Ireland.

Places are limited, so to ensure you will not be disappointed, please reserve your place by emailing  irishpoetrytherapynetwork@gmail.com

See Events page for more information on conference programme