Based on a true story, this first book came from a poem I wrote for my wonderful sister following the death of her much loved pot bellied pig, Dunstan. Through storytelling, rhyme and hand drawn pictures, I want to explore how we approach coping with grief and loss with children. I don’t claim to have the answers- I have my own experiences and my years in Early Childhood education; I have people I love who are shouldering immense burdens. But maybe Dunstan can help to start that most difficult of conversations.

Following on from my debut poetry collection – The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond– this new book will continue to explore the theme of living with difficult emotions though verse. Poetry for healing: Forever.

A million thank yous to my little sister for allowing me to share Dunstan’s story. For the latest release information, watch this space or check out my Facebook and Instagram pages.

The post ANNOUNCEMENT: New book release! first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

However, after a little conversation I realised that this could be an excellent opportunity to promote road safety (and of course, my book…). It also gave me the chance to talk about Amber Community and the support they offer on a new platform.

The finished article was published in That’s Life December 2024 MegaMonthly edition and went on sale on November 18th, 2024. The journalist had read the article to me a few weeks prior to it’s publication, so there weren’t any massive suprises. Overall, I am pleased with it.

I’ve shared my story a number of times now (see Catherine Hannah in the media). Prior to That’s Life, I’ve had two interviews with the Geelong advertiser and spoken to the media department at Epworth Hospital. I’ve told my tale at Amber Community Road Trauma Awareness seminars; and had an article printed by Crash Support Network quartlerly newsletter, Sharing our Survival. I’ve been interviewed live for local radio at 94.7 The Pulse; and spoken to a number of road trauma advocates and survivors through social media.

I’m learning that the value in my story- for myself as well as others- is in the telling. I tell and hold back to suit the focus of each context. For example, the radio interview was focussed on my relationship with Amber Community, whilst the focus of the That’s Life article was certainly on the rabbits.

Just as importantly, when sharing my story I tell and hold back to look after myself. I’m not a natural sharer and recovery is not linear; some days I feel more open than others. Having said that, I am finding it easier with practice. I am now a trained Lived Experience Volunteer Speaker with Amber Community. After my first training session, I was in awe of how easily some of the other participants seemed to be ble to share their devestating road trauma experiences. I wrote this poem the following day.

Sharing my Story

Today

you wear your story like a bridal gown.

Sumptuous ivory fabric, promising

dedication, nurture, love.

I am in awe

Formidable beauty

dazzling your trauma

as you speak your truth before your witnesses

a bouquet tossed in advocacy

to those who can’t speak up. Where you tread

heads turn, making their day

that bit better.

Tomorrow

you wear your story like armour.

Metallic plates formed from years

of tears and memory.

I am in awe

Light shatters against your helm

dazzling your trauma

as you stride through No Man’s Land

helping others to build armour of their own

A resounding battle cry to the world

this will not beat us.

I wear my story like underwear.

Not a negligée

but a frayed vest or greying pants

Something only my absolute closest ever sees.

Sometimes I wear it like camo gear

obscured in the undergrowth of a poem.

One day I too will dazzle my trauma

I will wear my story like armour

like a bridal gown

I just haven’t grown into it yet.

(Copyright Catherine Hannah 2024)

Last week I attended my first RTAS (Road Trauma Awareness Seminar) as a speaker. As expected, sharing my story wasn’t easy- for a start, the audience were a few steps away, watching me as I bared my soul. I included more detail, details I had never shared publicly before. I chose to do so because this is a chance to target the problem of dangerous driving choices right at the source. And -as I told my audience that night -I chose to do so in honour of all the people who didn’t make it out of their road traffic collisions, and there are far too many.

The post Sharing my story: When the personal becomes public first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

“It’s crash, not accident”

For some time now, I have been aware of the drive -excuse the pun- in road safety circles to use the term crash or collision rather than accident when referring to an incident on the road. It is an international shift; I have read articles and had discussions with advocates here in Australia as well as in the UK, Canada and the US.

Evidence shows that almost all vehicular collisions are the result of driver error; a very small percentage are the result of vehicle malfunction, medical emergency or a freak incident- such as a tree falling onto a car. It is argued that the term accident implies that no one is at fault, thus removing accountability from perpetrators- hence ‘crash, not accident’. Driver error comes from driver choice.

I will admit, it wasn’t a distinction I made until I was prompted to think about it. In fact, the first edition of my book The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond refers to my car accident on the back cover. As a writer, I could really have shown greater awareness of the powerful connotations of language choice; which in itself is a woeful oversight.

The (car crash, not accident) recovery rollercoaster

In terms of my own road trauma, my perceptions and feelings regarding life post crash continue to evolve beyond the growth depicted in The Ballad of the Bunny… As anyone managing the effects of trauma will attest, recovery is not linear and so yes, sometimes I do still feel anger towards the perpetrator of the crash I was involved in.

Perhaps this is why I didn’t instantaneously embrace the ‘crash, not accident’ argument. I desperately want to move on from that part of the trauma; I want to forgive. By considering the incident in these two apparently contradictory terms, I would be inviting resentment and moving away from my desired outcome. The concept just didn’t quite sit right with me yet and I couldn’t pinpoint why.

Making sense through poetry

Taking time to marinade on the subject has given me a much more favourable clarity. I played myself at Devil’s Advocate: Crash, not Accident edition. Are we being too sensitive? Very few people who break road safety rules (such as speeding) do so with the intention of causing harm to themselves or others- so surely it’s an accident? What about an honest mistake?

I also thought about what other situations spring to mind at the word ‘accident’ and the severity of their respective consequences. This is the poem that allowed me to articulate the melee of thoughts that have been rumbling around in my subconscious.

The Accident

You spilt a glass of orange juice today.

It happened so fast; yet as the promising young beverage

tumbled helplessly into the unknown

time seemed to stand still.

You didn’t mean to do it. Frozen

you watched your plans for the next ten minutes

splattered in a viscous tangerine catastrophe

across your jeans.

A silence fell, just for a moment

then questions, questions everywhere-

did you walk into the couch? Who put that couch there?

Did your hand spasm- are you possessed?

Then you remembered

oh God it had pulp and your nightmare descended

into Hell itself. How could you take such a risk?

Everyone knows the carnage fruity substance can cause

if spilled. Yet you dared attempt to make your miserable life a little sweeter

by naively buying the juice with pulp because

it won’t happen to you. The next minutes

-plural-

were spent in an awkward waddle to your bedroom

and the long search to find a replacement pair of pants

began.

You though you had time to nip across that intersection.

You thought you could quickly check your phone.

You thought one more drink couldn’t hurt.

You thought you could handle a car at that speed.

Oops.

(Copyright Catherine Hannah 2024)

(For more information on how poetry has supported my recovery, click here. This article is also available on Medium here).

Conclusion: Stepping back to move forwards

Considering this topic has prompted me to revisit blame around my accident and has certainly had an emotional impact. However -as with many of life’s challenges- I feel I have emerged stronger on the other side, with a fuller understanding of what happened that day than ever before. I very much doubt that the person who perpetrated my crash did so with the intention of seriously injuring themselves, their passenger or a stranger. Nevertheless, they made a risky decision- it was a mistake, but not an accident. Mistakes can be learned from and I believe that offending drivers can honour the casualties of those mistakes by doing just that. Driver education programs, such as those provided by Amber Community in Victoria, aim to change driver behaviour by helping perpetrators grow from past errors in order to make the roads a safer place to be.

The crash, not accident discourse reaches far deeper than sensitivities or offense. By using appropriate terminology, we are not only respecting the injured party by reporting the incident accurately, we are also promoting accountability; too many drivers do not recognise the responsibility we take in getting behind the wheel. Any topic that draws attention to this is surely a positive.

For further reading, please see:

Crash Support Network

Roadpeace

ABC News

Portland.gov

Disclaimer: I am not a medical professional; any advice given is purely anecdotal. If you need support in managing the effects of road trauma, please see my resources page for worldwide contacts and information.

This article is also available on Medium.

The post An uncomfortable question: Is it a crash or an accident? first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

help raise funds for those affected by road trauma

I have recently become involved with the quite wonderful Amber Community- Road Incident Support & Education. This registered charity supports Victorians who have been involved in road incidents or have lost loved ones on our roads by providing counselling services and an understanding community. Amber Community also run road trauma awareness seminars for various groups, including high school students and driver education program participants. The aim of the organisation is to challenge driving behaviours and to raise awareness of the impact road incidents can have on individuals and the community.

As May 5th- 12th is National Road Safety Week 2024 here in Australia, I will be using my book launch and LIVE online poetry reading to help raise funds for Amber Community’s annual Shine a Light on Road Safety campaign. My event will be free to attend, but the link to my fundraising page will be available throughout for any donations large or small. If you would like to make a donation prior to the event, you can do so here– it will be much appreciated. As well as the LIVE online poetry reading, I will also be taking part in Amber Community’s fundraising walk at Albert Park, Melbourne on Sunday May 5th. All are welcome to join!

explore poetry for healing

During the LIVE online poetry reading, I will be reading some of the poems from The Ballad of the Bunny… as well as some of my yet unpublished work. There will also be some behind-the-poem chatter and a tribute to those who have been lost on our roads around the world. You will also have the opportunity to ask questions about my poetry, Amber Community, the rabbits (who will likely be making an appearance…) or anything else that takes your fancy via the live message chat. I will do my best to answer any questions on the night. Any I don’t get round to, I will respond to in the Facebook event group as soon as possible after the event.

It is a book launch -belated as it is- so there will be a link available to purchase The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond. Please let me know if you purchase it during the event so I can give you a shout out! In recognition of National Road Safety Week 2024 the book will be temporarily on sale for the discounted price of AU$15.00+p&p (regular price $20.00+p&p) from 5th-12th May inclusive, when purchased directly from the author. Click here for details. THANK YOU to everyone who has purchased the book so far, I appreciate your support.

I am really looking forward to this event and hope that you will be around to share this milestone of an evening with me. Join me for my LIVE online poetry reading!

The post LIVE online poetry reading/fundraiser/book launch-May 12th 6:00pm first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

navigating change

After the car crash that left me with a broken neck and brain injury (and later diagnoses of Post Concussion Syndrome and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), I was advised to try journalling as a way to externalise my turbulent thoughts. I don’t want to diminish this widely used practice- but it wasn’t for me. I would pour out sentence fragments in a stream of consciousness. A sudden purge. Word vomit. I couldn’t spend any time organising my thoughts- they were far too confronting. It helped a little in that moment but if I tried to reread them later, it either disturbed me again or simply made no sense.

To facilitate minor trauma healing in years gone by, I’ve used song writing as a way of bringing my thoughts to the surface. I would sit at the piano and relish the process of joining melody, chord progression and lyrics. Others may start with the lyrics or the music, but I’ve always enjoyed watching the song evolve holistically. The snag now: I was physically unable to sit at the piano for longer than 10 minutes, let alone focus on three different elements at once. Even adapting by writing the lyrics and then the music would eventually involve the two aspects of playing and singing at the same time. I did not/ do not have the attention span for that.

I decided to focus on the lyrics, or- poetry. There are debates as to what differentiates poetry, prose and song lyrics. To me, it’s not something tangebile. Perhaps poetry has a certain musicality to it that differentiates it from prose and doesn’t require music to make it sing. I wrote my first healing poem, My Therapy, on 14th May 2021, almost a year after the crash. It proudly appears on page 15 of The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond.

Later -having made the decision to publish my poetry collection- I began the painful task of exploring the journal entries I made during the first year of my recovery. It was one of the most liberating exercises of my life.

creative trauma healing: my personal project approach

Both song writing and composing poetry offer a major difference to journalling and it is here that I believe the power of creative trauma healing lies. (For ease of reading I will refer hereon out to poetry only, though much of the following applies equally to song writing).

Writing a poem allows me to turn my feelings into a project. I am less focussed on the feelings themselves, instead concentrating on syllables, rhyme scheme and meter. This creates a distance between myself and the challenging concepts/ feelings. Once I have a product I am proud of, I can reread the poem and re experience those same feelings in a way that is now structured and organised in a way that makes sense to me.

I can also refer back to my poems at a later date and they still make sense as a readable, feelable snapshot of my emotional self at the time of writing. This allows me to monitor the progress of the trauma healing operation.

Whilst I enjoy writing free verse (poetry without consistent metre, syllable count etc), I find that striving to meet the guidelines of different poetry forms furthers this ‘project’ approach. Whilst other writers may find this constraining, I prefer to view the rules of poetic form as the hands that contain and cradle my challenging emotions and memories. The boundaries become my focus until I’m ready to address what’s inside.

a sneak peak at form

What do I mean by poetry forms? I will divulge here that I’m not completely new to poetry. I studied poetry as part of my Drama and Imaginative Writing degree at Liverpool John Moore’s University. However, since graduating in 2007 my interest had lain dormant. I recalled what I could and the internet provided the rest. Below is a quick introduction to the forms I enjoy most.

Haiku. Originating in Japan, the Haiku is made up of three lines- The first line has 5 syllables, the second has 7 and the final line has 5. Traditionally, the haiku exlpores nature and natural themes.

Tanka. Another Japanese form, the Tanka has 5 lines of 5,7,5,7,7 syllables respectively.

Sonnet. Often associated with Shakespear, the sonnet is made up of 14 lines altogether. The rhyme scheme of the first 12 lines are as follows: ABABCDCDEFEF. The sonnet concludes with two lines (GG) otherwise known as a rhyming couplet. This couplet may offer a conclusion or alternatively, a ‘twist’ to the earlier lines. Each line contains 10 syllables of iambic pentametre- the emphasis falls on the second syllable and alternative syllables thereafter.

Villanelle. I find meeting the intricate requirements of the villanelle most satisfying of all. This French form of poem consists of 19 lines- 5 tercets (stanzas of 3 lines), ending with a quatrain (4 line stanza). Lines 1, 6, 12 and 18 are the same; lines 3,9,15 and 19 are the same- and all of these lines rhyme. Lines 2,5, 8, 11, 14 and 17 all rhyme. The rhyme scheme is therefor: ABA ABA ABA ABA ABA ABAA.

There are many, many more forms of poetry. A more exhaustive list can be found here– I’ll let you know when I give some of these a go! It may also be said that rules are made to be broken. Or at least tweaked. For example, I started writing my poem Barbara in sonnet form, but felt that 14 lines didn’t do her story justice. By splitting the traditional 14 lines into 5 quatrains with a rhyming couplet conclusion (a total of 22 lines) I was able to express what I wanted to.

(N.B. Although I identified with the titular character’s story, it was not my story. Perhaps this is why I felt less reliant on the rules as a safety net? Interesting- I’d not pondered that until today).

trauma healing is no fairy tale

Rediscovering a love of poetry has given me a freedom of expression I never thought was possible. For some time, I couldn’t even narrate the events of that day without becoming distressed-even if I didn’t look it. Instead, I used allegory to bring my story to life in camouflage; citing the woeful tale of a rabbit who is unintentionally injured by an impatient visitor to her house. A consistent rhyme scheme and fairy tale tone provided focus to my ‘project’. Six months and seven poems after I first embraced poetry for trauma healing, The Ballad of the Bunny was born. I used this poem to form the title of the whole collection, as afterall- this is where it all began.

by Catherine Hannah, April 2024

I would like to make it clear that the above is purely a testimonial of my experience of embracing poetry as a tool for trauma healing. I am not a medical professional in any way! I would like to reiterate my thoughts from the opening paragraph- I believe poetry can be a useful support alongside medical intervention and other therapies.

The post Trauma healing and the extraordinary hidden power of poetry first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

One of my favourite things about poetry (and art in general) is how open a piece is to interpretation based on the consumers’ own context. I’ve had some truly insightful comments from readers of The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond. I love how someone can draw comfort from my poems in a way I had not considered- both writer and reader find our own healing. So, it will be interesting to see if interpretation of my written work changes between reading and watching a performance of it.

It will be great to have a dedicated space to take my written poetry to the next level; where I can experiment in blending my words with music, art and film for a truly mutimedia poetry experience.

Please check it out here and if the content resonates, please like, subscribe and share. I would much appreciate it!

I’ve had a hectic few weeks health wise, but I am starting to look once more at a LIVE reading of some of the poems from my book- keep an eye on Facebook, Instagram and now YouTube as well as right here for details in the near future!

The post YouTube channel is now LIVE! first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

The EBook version is also available for preorder, if that is more your thing.

Many thanks to everyone who has supported me not only through my first foray into the world of self publishing, but also during my ongoing recovery. I could not do this alone.

I very much hope that everyone who reads this book is able to take something positive from it. THANK YOU!

The post Release announcement! first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

Hello! Unfortunately due to a few life hiccups (including a flare up of symptoms and a sick rabbit), the release date of The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond will have to be postponed. Looking at publishing in late February at this stage, but will confirm a date and purchasing information asap. Such is life! Apologies for those who were looking forward to being able to buy the book next week.

The post Release date postponed first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

“…a beautifully written diary of how our lives are suddenly changed after being injured in a crash…Whether you’re on your own recovery path or supporting someone through theirs, this poetry is a beacon of hope and resilience”. -S. Dawne McKay, Founder of the Crash Support Network.

The Crash Support Network was born as a result of founder Dawne’s own horrific experience of road trauma and now offers much needed support, advice and resources to others affected by collisions. Find them at https://crashsupportnetwork.com/

“…uncomplicated language takes us through a manifold of multilayered emotions. There are moments of touching despair that made me cry, which were pleasantly dispersed with delicate humour… Being a three-time stroke sufferer, I personally liked her poem “Invisible”. My verdict? I cannot recommend this title highly enough”. –Ivor Steven, writer for Coffee House Writers Magazine and author of Tullawalla and Perceptions.

More information on Ivor can be found at https://ivorplumberpoet.press/about/

I was genuinely touched that my poetry has received two such beautiful reviews and that my words were able to make a personal impact. That’s what poetry for healing is all about!

Full reviews can be found by clicking the ‘reviews’ tab.

The post Pre-release book reviews are in! first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.

I chatted with all sorts of interesting and friendly writers about the self publishing process, their own work, and my car accident and experiences post road trauma; and concluded that my decision to self publish my debut poetry collection was the correct one. With a project as personal as The Ballad of the Bunny and Other Poems: The Diary of a Car Crash and Beyond, I need full creative control. On leaving, we were treated to a musical recital by performance poet Linnet Hunter and her autoharp! As a poet and musician, I was obviously enamoured by this.

I left the fair with a handful of new connections, two poetry books and a heap of useful advice and resources- distributed a few of my poetry collection pocket promos too. Definitely the type of event I would like to be part of in the future!

Purchases from Ivor Steven & Derrick Knight (an Australian-English collaboration featuring photographs from the UK and poems written by Ivor in Australia) and Linnet Hunter and Lynne Matheson (an illustrated journal of wrting prompts). Also had lovely chats and gathered information from local authors Kelly Wilson, Danielle Hughes, Judy Rankin and Caz Carter; and Judy Reid at Jaymah Press.

The post Indie Author Book Fair first appeared on Catherine Hannah Poetry.