From Personal Trauma to Collective History: The Power of Witness and Confessional Poetry in Confronting Trauma
When I found the section on the Holocaust in Against Forgetting: Twentieth-Century Poetry of Witness, Carolyn Forché’s words struck me deeply: “This horror has been said to have ‘ruptured’ history, and those who live in its aftermath cannot escape the knowledge that such atrocity is possible” (361). Living in the aftermath, it is clear that all of us have borne witness to atrocities —Guatemala, 1962; Zanzibar, 1964; Cambodia, 1975; Rwanda, 1994; Syria, 2014; Myanmar, 2016; Palestine, 2023—and each of these horrors, like the Holocaust, ruptures how we think about the world and how we create art.
This realization led me to consider the ways poetry bears witness to these ruptures and the different ways it approaches and encapsulates trauma. While witness poetry directly addresses collective suffering, often documenting historical atrocities, confessional poetry delves into the personal, emotional aftermath of trauma, frequently focusing on the poet’s own experience. As I explored each form, it became clear that, despite their distinct approaches, witness and confessional poetry share a deep engagement with memory, loss, and the complexities of identity.
In this project, I will write six original poems—three in the witness tradition and three in the confessional tradition—based on the same events. By comparing and contrasting these two poetic forms, I hope to illuminate both the similarities and the subtle differences between them, while also demonstrating that both genres deserve thoughtful study for the unique perspectives they provide on trauma, memory, and the complexities of human experience.
Ultimately, my project seeks to challenge how we think about the ways poetry captures trauma—both personal and collective. It asks us to reconsider the boundaries between self and society, between individual pain and the broader human condition. By exploring witness and confessional poetry side by side, my goal is not only to highlight the significance of each form but to urge us to confront the layers of history and identity that continue to shape us. In a world where trauma, suffering, and injustice persist, understanding the different ways we bear witness to and express these experiences can push us to act with greater empathy, urgency, and responsibility toward one another.
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