There are three poets who inspire me ~ three mythopoeic visionaries who saw beyond the world of appearances.
First there is William Blake. “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.” That’s Blake. He was a great painter and poet. He had visions and his prophetic poetry reveals what he glimpsed through those cleansed doors.
Then there is the sublime dream poetry of Dante and Novalis. The Divine Comedy is one of the most magnificent epic poems in world literature. It is Dante’s dream journey through hell, purgatory, and heaven. Novalis was the young German poet who wrote the dream of the blue flower ~ the mystic symbol of longing for heavenly bliss.
Blake, Dante, Novalis ~ three mythopoeic visionaries. I consider them all philosopher-poets.
First there is William Blake. “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.” That’s Blake. He was a great painter and poet. He had visions and his prophetic poetry reveals what he glimpsed through those cleansed doors.
Then there is the sublime dream poetry of Dante and Novalis. The Divine Comedy is one of the most magnificent epic poems in world literature. It is Dante’s dream journey through hell, purgatory, and heaven. Novalis was the young German poet who wrote the dream of the blue flower ~ the mystic symbol of longing for heavenly bliss.
Blake, Dante, Novalis ~ three mythopoeic visionaries. I consider them all philosopher-poets.
