Everything is biographical . . . . What we make, why it is made, how we draw a dog, who it is we are drawn to, why we cannot forget. Everything is collage . . . . There is the hidden presence of others in us, even those we have known briefly. We contain them for the rest of our lives, at every border that we cross.
  ~ Lucian Freud
A photo of the author

Peggy Osna Heller
—renowned poetry therapist, clinical social worker, educator, international workshop leader and lecturer, former president of the National Association for Poetry Therapy and the National Federation for Biblio/Poetry Therapy.

Reared by a family of word-lovers and hobbled by childhood illnesses, I was a kid enchanted by stories on the radio and in the books that were my friends. The story of the little lame prince, confined to a tower and visited by a strange old woman the grown-ups called “stuff and nonsense” but whose real name was “Imagination,” was my favorite. I learned about poetry therapy after a long professional career in teaching, and it has been my passion ever since.

Memoir is a kind of collage, a collection of layered images, words, and experiences integrated into the emotional and psychological development process. Though seemingly unrelated as lived, the disparate elements become decipherable as pattern when viewed with hindsight’s perspective. Sharing my adventures in the form of memoir is the goal of Word Arts Collage. Come find yourself in these stories that I hope will inspire you to tell your own.