Rorty On Poetry

in response to his baptist cousin’s question as to whether he had started looking to religion as a way of dealing with his newfound pancreatic cancer of which nothing medical could be done he simply replied, “no”--- to one son asking if philosophy was doing anything for him he repeated the same--- in fact, it wasn’t until he was asked if anything at all had brought him meaning in those last days, that he answered without pause--- “poetry.” beyond all the vast reading that this brilliant man had done in his life all the intellectual horizons that he had pondered it was the “slow meanders” & “stuttering embers” which brought him life--- the flavors of words which he himself could never cook up those rhythms & rhymes which the likes straight-up philosophers had never seemed to grasp with the same umph that poetry did. may the rest of us be so lucky as to “stockpile” our hearts & minds with the words of our favorite poets & lyricists who have formed the backbone of every step through this hopscotch game we call life.