ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the first poem that Thomas Ogden published in Psychoanalytic Perspectives, and also included is a poem by his niece, Emily B. Ogden. Thomas Ogden, a psychoanalyst in San Francisco, is among the most creative analysts. For him, psychoanalysis is an art and he uses poetry and writing as part of the analytic process. Ogden has written two novels: The Hands of Gravity and Chance and The Parts Left Out. For him, writing is an essential part of life. Ogden is interested in what lies between the words of a poem, with particular interest in the sounds and texture of the voice. In his clinical work, Ogden strives to be receptive to "the music between the notes." He's less interested in the manifest content of the patient's narrative than in the conscious and unconscious feelings that the narrative evokes in him. Ogden has published twelve books on psychoanalytic theory and practice, which have been translated into nineteen languages.
