Trebes, T. M. (2025). Symbol, space, and time: a triadic framework for language formation in poetry therapy.
Trebes, T. M. (2025). Symbol, space, and time: a triadic framework for language formation in poetry therapy.
Journal of Poetry Therapy, 1–12.
Abstract
Patients in psychotherapy often struggle to articulate inner experiences, especially after trauma. Yet the therapeutic process relies on the gradual emergence of verbal expression. Expressive poetry therapy offers a transitional medium, bridging the gap between pre-verbal affect and communicable language. This paper presents the Triad of Triangulation Mechanisms, a model integrating insights from psychoanalytic, narrative, and arts-based therapies into three interrelated dimensions: Contentual Triangulation (through metaphor and symbolic language), Spatial Triangulation (within the therapeutic “transitional space”), and Temporal Triangulation (via past, present, and future narratives). Drawing on interdisciplinary literature and clinical experience, the model frames how poetic writing functions as a mediating third to foster agency, containment, and integration. It offers a structure for understanding poetry therapy’s capacity to transform fragmented experience into shared speech, with implications for clinical work and future research.