When writing prose, we find it easier to camouflage our inner self. Poetry though, even if it is something we try to 'make up', tends to get under our defences and we reveal that which we try to hide.

In other words, poetry makes us more vulnerable, but at the same time, if we use it to open ourselves to the world, we lose much of that vulnerability, since we no longer fear letting others get to know the real person inside us.

...and that real person? I find it is usually a child, or, childlike in its needs. It is what what helps save me from growing old (in the way I think). I hope it does so for you also.