One of the more than 1,500 poems shared on Toronto’s public transit network by Poems in Passage.Poems in Passage
If you’ve ridden the Toronto subway lately, you may have stumbled upon an unexpected bit of poetry in the ad space on the car.
Maybe it was a haiku by Martin Gomes about the eternal nature of the seed cycle, or a few verses on the gift of growing older by Lillian Allen.
If those words brightened your day, made you pause to contemplate or just distracted you for a little while during your long commute, these posters by Poems in Passage will have done their job.
Dr. Latif Murji, a physician affiliated with the University of Toronto and the co-founder of Poems in Passage, says that these poems “give Torontonians moments of reflection, inspiration and emotional connection.”
The 1,500 posters, which can be found on subways, buses and streetcars in the city, feature works by local writers both established and emerging. They reach about 5.1 million riders monthly, according to the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). Murji says that the current series of posters includes poems from writers like Margaret Atwood, Rupi Kaur, Mustafa the Poet and more.
They’re also a prime example of the way that public art can help ease some of the mental health burden that comes from living in a city.
Case in point: The World Economic Forum found that people feel lonelier in crowded cities. There is a loneliness epidemic in Canada, especially among older adults, a third of whom report feeling lonely.
Art and poetry can help people “take us out of our groove and bring us into a moment of connection with another mind, thoughts and feelings,” explains Eva-Marie Stern, an art psychotherapist and adjunct faculty in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. Public art is “a visible sign of the city saying to us: You are not alone.”
Stern says that the public aspect of public art is especially important.
“Surprise is a real gift: that feeling of awe or a gentle surprise of something new or novel in our world that isn’t impinging on us can be such a relief and bring us out of our usual trains of thought to pay attention for a moment to something someone else made.”
Murji and his co-founder Addesse Haile started Poems in Passage with that mission in mind.
Murji says he and Haile came up with the idea in the summer of 2023, reflecting on their commutes to school from Scarborough and the impact that Poetry on the Way – an old program discontinued in 2012 – had on them. He and Haile both recalled being deeply affected by the poems, paying close attention to them on their daily commutes and even memorizing some of the poems.
“Poetry is a unique art form because it’s concise, deeply emotional and can deliver an emotional impact in just a few seconds or a few lines,” says Murji. “Poetry is an accessible mental health tool – it doesn’t require therapy sessions or even financial cost. It’s just there in a public space and offers a brief reflection and comfort.”
Allison Crawford, a psychiatrist and senior scientist at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), and her team at the Health Equity through Art Research and Technology (HEART) lab, conducted a survey in 2021 in connection with a public art exhibit at the Bentway in downtown Toronto.
Ninety-six per cent of respondents said that public art is important or very important to health and well-being and 95 per cent said that public art is important or very important to community building. Public art beautifies space, lifts the spirit and can prompt reflection, Crawford adds.
Stern says that art has the unique ability to connect artists, a piece of art and viewers, and interacting with art can make people less lonely.
She points to a sculpture near Hart House in Toronto, called Mask #1 by Evan Grant Penny. It’s an inverted face that invites passersby to touch it and sit in it.
“You can have a relationship with it, and it gives people this sense, not even consciously, that there’s someone with them,” says Stern. “You are no longer alone, at least for a moment.”
As for Poems in Passage, taking over advertising space with local poetry that imparts better mental health for commuters is so important, especially in the midst of the loneliness epidemic.
“Public spaces should be for the public to enjoy, and public art is an underused public health intervention,” says Murji. “Even though it’s something that beautifies our spaces and provides benefits for the public and opportunities for artists in our community.”