Lean Forward and Listen: poetry as a mode of understanding in medicine

Many claims have been made over recent years for the use of poetry (and, more broadly, literature) in the curriculum of medical students. Most often, poetry is put forward as having the potential to humanize medicine by promoting, for example, empathy, ethical sensitivity, and an appreciation for diverging interpretations. While these endpoints are all important, this essay uses the experience of a junior doctor undertaking a degree in creative writing to consider how the poetic way of seeing and thinking differs from clinical thinking, and why that might matter. In particular, the author considers the importance in medicine of the capacity to not know, as well as the possibilities for a deeper understanding of patients offered by thinking in terms of poetic voice.