Voices of Courage with Ken D Foster
Voices of Courage, September 29, 2026
Voices of Courage with Ken D Foster How Poetry Heals: Words, Seasonal Affective Disorder and Transcendence with Norman Rosenthal Ken D. Foster talks with psychiatrist and author Dr. Norman Rosenthal about how poetry can heal grief and trauma, why he first described seasonal affective disorder, and how Transcendental Meditation shapes his forthcoming book on unity. A Show Built On the Power of Words Ken D. Foster opens Voices of Courage with a preview of the conversation to come, reading a few lines from a poem before rolling the show's intro theme and returning to formally welcome listeners. He tells his audience that words carry an energy, a frequency and a vibration connected deeply to the psyche, and that reading a poem can make the world seem to disappear, carrying a listener back into memory or forward into peace and presence. Foster mentions that he has spent roughly thirty years writing poems himself and has a forthcoming poetry collection called "Echoes of Courage and Grace: Reflections from the Journey Within." He explains that poetry can bypass people's defenses, awaken memory, reveal truth and restore hope in ways ordinary words sometimes cannot. He then introduces his guest, a psychiatrist he says will help listeners understand where words can transform how they think, communicate and show up in the world. Introducing Dr. Norman Rosenthal Foster formally introduces Dr. Norman Rosenthal, welcoming him back to the show and describing him as a psychiatrist who understands darkness from both a scientific and deeply human perspective. He notes that Rosenthal led the team that first described seasonal affective disorder, known as SAD, and that his pioneering work on light therapy has helped millions of people, along with his exploration of meditation, adversity and resilience. Foster highlights Rosenthal's book "Poetry Rx: How 50 Inspiring Poems Can Heal and Bring You Joy to Your Life," calling him a New York Times best-selling author. Rosenthal thanks Foster for having him back. Foster explains he wants to start with poetry, calling it a door to the soul, and mentions his niece in Washington, D.C. who is depressed, wondering aloud whether Rosenthal's book might help her. He asks directly why Rosenthal wrote "Poetry Rx" and what the book is about, opening the door for Rosenthal's story about a phone call with a grieving friend. The Origin Story and Why Words Heal Rosenthal tells Foster the book began with a phone call from a grieving friend who had lost someone dear and asked how he would ever manage. Rosenthal told him that losing is an art that, like any art form, can be developed, prompting his friend to read Elizabeth Bishop's villanelle "One Art" aloud over the phone. Rosenthal recalls feeling the man's relief and his own sense of elation, realizing in that moment that words can actually heal. Foster then asks Rosenthal, as a scientist and psychiatrist, why words heal at all. Rosenthal explains that words carry both meaning and music, a combination that has drawn people around fires for thousands of years to share poetry that produces hope, potency or anger. He says this taps into primitive cognitive and visceral areas of the mind. Foster asks how a poem that triggers anger can still lead someone toward peace, and Rosenthal answers with Dylan Thomas's "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night," written to his dying father, reading several lines aloud. Grief, Struggle and the Music of Words The conversation moves through several more poems Rosenthal has collected. He reads "Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep," telling the story of a Baltimore woman who wrote it for a German refugee unable to return to her dying mother during World War II, and says it gave the most comfort to people he has shared it with who were grieving or dying themselves. He then reads Theodore Roethke's "The Waking," describing how the Pulitzer Prize winner captured the daily struggle of simply getting up in the morning. Foster and Rosenthal discuss poetic structures, from sonnets and villanelles to free verse and the ghazal, before Rosenthal reads Gwendolyn Brooks's short poem "We Real Cool." Turning to why some people resist poetry, Rosenthal argues they may love songs and ballads without realizing these belong to the same family as poetry. He invokes Marshall McLuhan's line that "the medium is the message," arguing that real connectedness, whether around a dinner table or in a poem, communicates that a person matters. Listening, Silence and a Letter to a Mother Foster shifts the conversation toward listening itself, describing himself as a long-term meditator who believes stillness is the key to writing and connecting with the divine part of oneself. Rosenthal responds by reading Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," noting that the poem's quiet imagery magnifies every small sound through silence. Foster compares the experience to cycling, describing a "zone" where time seems to collapse while doing something he loves, and says poetry brings him into that same deep inward space. Rosenthal then shares a personal poem, "Letter to Mother" by Nobel laureate Salvatore Quasimodo, which he read repeatedly before leaving South Africa for the United States, knowing he was leaving his family behind. He describes the poem's closing image of a kitchen clock with an enamel dial and painted flowers, and says he later bought such a clock from Italy that he and his wife still look at, thinking of the people they left behind. Seasonal Affective Disorder, Meditation and Closing Thoughts Foster asks Rosenthal to reflect on his own journey, and Rosenthal answers with gratitude, recalling a near-fatal assault at age twenty-four and crediting the National Institute of Mental Health's funding for making his seasonal affective disorder research possible. The two turn to SAD itself, with Rosenthal describing how his own move from sunny South Africa to New York exposed him and his wife to lethargy, oversleeping and difficulty socializing once daylight savings time shortened the days. He recommends morning light exposure, outdoor walking, staying socially connected and, in some cases, an antidepressant, pointing listeners to his book "Defeating SAD." Foster shares his own story of hearing an inner voice in 1992 tell him he had to feel the pain to make the change. Rosenthal then describes practicing Transcendental Meditation twice daily and outlines stages of consciousness explored in his books "Transcendence" and "Super Mind," previewing a forthcoming book, "Unity," about healing societal division. Foster closes by pointing listeners to Rosenthal's books on Amazon and signing off with the show's closing line.
