[wendy v]

Mark, I'm not sure which modern philosophers you refer to. These mentioned above are not thinkers for whom intuition is not, as they say, the mind's piston.

I guess there are no relevant living philosophers... Let me get in another plug for Dillard then, who I think shows signs of greatness, if only she'd stop writing poems. I recommend her strange little book, "For the Time Being". Abandon all expectation.

I'm surprised too, that modern poets don't drink more from the philosopher's well. As poets interested in rhythms and meters (which is music which is math, which is reason which is order which exists as brother to chaos), I'm especially surprised.

I think it's the contemporary aversion to granting the intellect any credence, as though doing so might sully the spirit, as if the two were in competition. As if the immortals were not in possession of both reason and intuition ! I would speculate that our emphasis on interpretation has brought modern poets to take Positions, rather than embody life's complexities in ever-evolving philosophies. One would hardly call Yeats, Frost, RPW, or ED didactic, and yet they touch many of us as teachers, with philosophic leanings. I wouldn't call them poets of witness, but poets for whom witnessing has formed not just a unique poetry, but what might be called a philosophy in motion. The term 'voice' is the new stand-in for the whole shebang, which sort've implies, rather bloodlessly and mindlessly, it seems to me, song without flesh, or instrument. Or to go back to Andrew's Yeats quote, vibration with no deep string, no marrow bone. I remind myself of these kinds of thoughts each time I produce what I call a float away poem.

Might be interesting to see samples of contemporary poems people perceive as well wedded to philosophy ...

[Mary Meriam]

Hi Wendy - I love philosophy, and I love reading certain philosophers. So, yes, I'm drinking from the well, every chance I get. Susan Howe, Bachelard, and Nietzsche are three of my faves.

[Mark Allinson]

“I think it's the contemporary aversion to granting the intellect any credence, as though doing so might sully the spirit, as if the two were in competition.”


Wendy, yes, hardly in competition – in fact, I see “intellect” and “spirit” as synonyms.

In the standard Western metaphysic, we have the polarity of “mind” and “matter”, and all that is abstract, rational, spiritual, belongs on the “mind’ side, and all that is gross, material, earthy, etc., is on the “matter” side. So "spirit" and "intellect" are a continuum.

Why I like James Hillman’s version of Neoplatonism, is that it reinstates the “metaxy”, the middle realm between abstract “mind” and concrete “matter”, by positing psyche, or “soul” as the middle realm, joining the other two poles.

So we have: Body (matter), Soul psyche, and Mind (Spirit).

The middle realm, the realm of the psyche, is the realm of imagination, as distinct from rational, logical thought. And psyche is where poetry is born. Well, in the interaction between Spirit and Psyche, and Matter, I would say. But the images of poetry originate in the psychic realm.

However, in modern times, this middle term has vanished from our cultural consciousness – we moderns and postmoderns have, in short, lost our souls – our emotional intelligence. No wonder poetry is almost dead in the wider culture.

[Andrew Frisardi]

Mark,

I agree with everything you say (and I love the Tao te Ching quote), except your point that poetry necessarily completes abstract philosophy. The things that the Tao says in that quote are also said by some of the best philosophers who wrote in more abstract terms--for instance, John Scotus Eriugena, whose writings were banned by the Church in the Middle Ages because of their pantheistic implications. Or Plato in his very difficult dialogue the Parmenides. Or Heidegger. I agree with Wendy's point that reason and intuition and revelation--the whole shebang--should be brought into the mix. I should specify that I mean inspired reason, reason that has dipped into the Muses' well. Certainly reason as a mere function of ego and the limited horizontal perspective cannot go very far in philosophy. I don't think that poetry is what the greatest philosophers would have written if they could have. To each their calling.

Wendy made a good suggestion: contemporary philosophical poems. Mary mentioned Susan Howe, whose work I don't know. Robert Hass has written some good poetry in a philosophical vein, although I don't have anything of his onhand to quote from.

In my opinion, much of postmodern philosophy has kicked the shit out of philosophy as a discipline. It has cut it off at the roots, leaving it to dry out. Philosophy reduced to clever manipulation of words and notions. The attack on post-Enlightenment reason has in fact been a hyper-rationalistic enterprise.

I completely agree with Mark about emotional intelligence, the middle realm of soul that Hillman talked about, the imaginal, as Henry Corbin called it, where meaning takes on form and form takes on meaning. It needs to be revived, and poetry can play a part in that. But philosophers can too: Mark, as you know, intellect is not the same as reason, in ancient and medieval philosophy; it refers to intuitive, immediate grasp of things, essential things. That's necessary too, and for that there has to be a metaphysical discourse, not only poetry per se.

A recent, though not contemporary, philosophical poet was Robert Duncan (a favorite of Hillman's, by the way):

Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow

as if it were a scene made-up by the mind,
that is not mine, but is a made place,

that is mine, it is so near to the heart,
an eternal pasture folded in all thought
so that there is a hall therein

that is a made place, created by light
wherefrom the shadows that are forms fall.

Wherefrom fall all architectures I am
I say are likenesses of the First Beloved
whose flowers are flames lit to the Lady.

She it is Queen Under The Hill
whose hosts are a disturbance of words within words
that is a field folded.

It is only a dream of the grass blowing
east against the source of the sun
in an hour before the sun's going down

whose secret we see in a children's game
of ring a round of roses told.

Often I am permitted to return to a meadow
as if it were a given property of the mind
that certain bounds hold against chaos,

that is a place of first permission,
everlasting omen of what is.




[This message has been edited by Andrew Frisardi (edited August 29, 2008).]

[Mark Allinson]

Oh, yes, Andrew, I agree that the higher reaches of reason, the spiritual realm of Nous, is one of direct unmediated knowing. It is the descent of this spirit into the psychic middle realm - the marriage of spirit and soul - which produces "inspired" poetry.

This poem (a fragment here) seems to concern this realm of direct knowing. And in my reading, it confirms the Heraclitean saying that "the way up and the way down are the same" - the "gods" (or archetypes) are the both the highest and the lowest.

From "The Labyrinth"

- Edwin Muir (1887-1959)


Since I emerged that day from the labyrinth,
Dazed with the tall and echoing passages,
The swift recoils, so many I almost feared
I’d meet myself returning at some smooth corner,
Myself or my ghost, for all there was unreal
After the straw ceased rustling and the bull
Lay dead upon the straw and I remained ...

I could not live if this were not illusion.
It is a world, perhaps; but there’s another.
For once in a dream or trance I saw the gods
Each sitting on the top of his mountain-isle,
While down below the little ships sailed by.
Toy multitudes swarmed in the harbours, shepherds drove
Their tiny flocks to the pastures, marriage feasts
Went on below, small birthdays and holidays,
Ploughing and harvestingand life and death,
And all permissible, all acceptable,
Clear and secure as in a limpid dream.
But they, the gods, as large and bright as clouds,
Conversed across the sounds in tranquil voices
High in the sky above the troubled sea,
And their eternal dialogue was peace
Where all things were woven, and this our life
Was as a chord deep in this dialogue,
As easy utterance of harmonious words,
Spontaneous syllables bodying forth a world.

That was the real world; I have touched it once,
And now shall know it always. But the lie,
The maze, the wild-wood waste of falsehood, roads
That run and run and never reach an end,
Embowered in error – I’d be prisoned there
But that my soul has birdwings to fly free.

Oh these deceits are strong almost as life.
Last night I dreamt I was in the labyrinth,
And woke far on. I did not know the place.

[Andrew Frisardi]

Great quote to bring in, Mark. Edwin Muir is one of my favorite 20th-century poets. And he did experience this directly, as he describes in his autobiography. Thanks for the Heraclitus, too.

Editing back in to add an anecdote. I read this Muir poem once to a group of writers at a writers' retreat. Dead, embarrassed silence was the response. Then dismissal. We postmoderns are supposed to keep this stuff under a lid.



[This message has been edited by Andrew Frisardi (edited August 29, 2008).]

[Tim Love]

I've barely read Bonnefoy. He's far from the only French poet with a reputation for being a bit that way, but his theoretical works are of sufficient interest that he influences himself - I've read that the dividing line between his poetic and philosophical works isn't always clear.

And Wittgenstein's a stylistic inflence for some. I recall trying to sound like him.

[Mike Todd]

Andrew—

Mary Midgely: there's a good living philosopher for you.

I'm with Mark to an extent regards modern philosophy. It's little more than a byname for rational enquiry. To be fair, though, the first steps on the road to reason were taken by Plato in the guise of Socrates. But Plato was an idealist. The typical modern philosopher swings the other way. Both wrongly conflate property with substance. We need more out-and-out dualists.

[Andrew Frisardi]

Mike - I hadn't heard of Mary Midgely and should have. Having now read about her at Wikipedia, I see what you mean. Anyone who takes on Dawkins is alright by me.

[Mike Todd]

Andrew—

To be fair, her beef with Dawkins wasn't the prettiest affair. She didn't exactly do the anti-ultra-Darwinian camp a lot of favours. But all the same, we knew where she was coming from: Dawkins is an asshole. And almost everything else she's written is wonderful—first rate.