2.48
Poetic thinking, thinking rooted in metaphoric structure, can see things differently. Not poetry as a literary form. Poetry can be, but needn’t be, poetic; just as the poetic can be, but needn’t be, poetry. (It follows that not all poetry is poetic.)
Poetic thinking is differently attentive, as though it tugs loose strands woven through the world to reveal other patterns, other connections. Poetic thinking thinks in leaps.
This thinking responds differently, letting beings appear as the beings they are: not grounded in the general circulation, it interrupts this circulation through the unexpected, through surprise, through drawing together various axes of resonance for us, and finds patterns that aren’t necessarily unilateral or linear.[1]
This style of thinking emerges from an experience of the world. It challenges and bends language to resonate with the experience. And it challenges the reader to respond to the provocation to see things like this; but to see things like this, you can’t see things the way you usually do.
[1] See Zwicky on uni- vs polydimensionality, axes of resonance, and integrity: Lyric Philosophy, LH3–6, LH172, LH181, LH195, LH234, LH239.