PhiLOLsophers

Following Andrew's lead, i've made some of my own lolfilosofers or, as others have called them, philolsophers. As he explains it,

One recent internet phenomenon has become known as a lolcat: a cute or funny picture of a cat, using non-standard grammar and spelling (usually 1337). More generally, these are known as image macros. Odd pictures with funny captions. In this grand tradition, I start this series dedicated to lolfilosofers.

Here is my contribution to the tradition. A series on some of philosophy's most noted theorists of language.




More to come!

Often

It's not often
That a midnight stroll,
a break from the ritualistically routine
of a shut door for shut eye,
brings me to a destination
where I simply stand
alone, ill-equipped
for the weather,
and simply stare at the sky.

More often than not,
this instant
is prevented by ceilings, sleep,
the eyes of a woman,
and the atmospheric residue
from the industry
of a city
that Baudrillard called
"a town of fabulous proportions
but without space or dimensions."
And that gives asthma
to the luckiest.

But ever so often,
My eyes take in
the worlds that litter
the endless expanse above.

And just as I'm pondering
the possibility
of planetary nuclear weapons,

the sprinklers spray the silence.

The Student of Philosophy: Part I

Stained carpets,
And an ever aging man.
This is the context
Of upper-division philosophy.
Ancient pages,
Struggling to stay relevant,
Are turned with hope
Of being or becoming
A philosopher more exciting
Than this old man.

A nearly empty auditorium,
And a white-haired scholar.
This is the setting
Of visiting professors lectures
Having crossed
The discordant ocean
From here to the Continent(al).
But having forgotten to take us,
All we ascend to
Are pronunciations of German names.

Let's Get Lazy

Let's get lazy together
Just you, me and a rowboat for two.

On a placid lake in a perfect afternoon
With nobody on the far shore,
On any horizon,
From every vantage point.
Nothing except a fleet of ducks.
And a lone sleek heron.
Watching lovers with a feigned curiosity.

And let us lo(o)se
The oars from our gentle grips
So we drift for hours
Upon ever more endless hours.
With our free hands
Now attending to the other.

Our crumbs from the (wheat-free) bread
Will feed our family
Of following ducks
That linger behind
And close to the shore.

Who remind me of myself
The I before you.
When my mind would process
– At a safe shallow of course –
Every impression, glance, and thought
That had crumbled in your wake.

But now I can watch
In content natural silence
As you'll lazily smile
And my lips will curl in kind.

And if I'm lucky,
Maybe they'll introduce themselves.

An initiation that is far from temporal.
And a sign!
Of the best part about this drift
Through the existential ebb and flow.
Which signifies this:
Just as I'm perpetually becoming
But never being;
I'll never know,
But always be knowing.

Alas, as the sun follows our trend
And lazily floats in the expanse
Towards the now awakening Orient,
Let us leave this lake,
With our hands breaking their hold
To replace the narrow paddles
that are shadows in the distance.

Just as the Heron
Ends his lethargy,
And breaks the waters tranquility.

Thursday on Tuesday

A parallel transcendence
over this urbanized atmosphere!
Where we're shocked at life
that we didn't take or didn't create!
Where anything left or right
of center is too much color
(for this landscape
of smoke stacks and worn faces)!
Where I only speak when dissonance cuts
the air so that I won't be heard!


Baffled by what I just wrote,
I turned the music off.

Pondering the Second Week of August

It seems strange
To let topography,
Allotments of land
And familiarity with something
Which you did not choose.
Be that what people call ‘home.’

Or as any cross stitch
Will tell you,
As it hangs in the entry way.
Or above a piano.
The definition of ‘home’
“Is where the heart is.”

But this also seems like a misuse.
Because its caged in my ribs.
Despite its beating
Against the boned cell.
Its never let out.
This makes ‘home’ wherever I am.
And the steel bathroom
Of a city diner
Is no home.
Regardless of the mirror
Which has been turned into a canvas
For a spray-painted spectacle.

Even with poetic license,
It still seems out of place.
For my heart then is with God.
Who confuses things
By being omnipresent.

Yet I’m no gypsy.
Who moves from place to place.
With a song in my voice,
A jingle and a jangle
From my tattered clothes,
and a foreign dance in my step.
I don’t even have a pet monkey
With clothes matching my own
Complete with a funny little hat.

So maybe vague familiarity
With the extension
Of self-ownership,
Is all ‘home’
Turns out to be.
Making your piece
Of this old rock:
A place of comfort.
An escape that brings contentedness
From the strangeness of this world.

Ludwig and Love

Wittgenstein was so apropos.
"We have a craving," he said.
"A craving for generality."

And dear friend,
In my own naivety,
This was even true with you.

I wanted you proper and formulaic.
With no deviation from the models
That I saw above and around.

Especially not the abstraction
That I painted in my mind,
with the broadest of strokes,
and the utmost delicacy.
Paying perfect attention,
To you, whom I knew not.

Squared flickering static,
Provided your set and stage.
Sunsets on worn piers,
Downpours in city streets,
and Airport rendezvous.
In a frequency and magnitude,
That Spark's Noah and Allie could admire.

I essentialized you like I knew you.
I even knew your three Greek names.
And your five languages.

Yes, I was a phenomenologist.
With my theory and endless speculation.
I had all that was needed to begin the course
- Like a dinner table perfectly set -
Everything except the phenomena.

But companion of mine,
completely unannounced,
You entered the scene.
Not on the poorly painted set,
That I’m embarrassed to be responsible for,
But on your own majestic stage.
That materialized before my bare eyes.

And rushing in with you came simultaneity.
As everything was (and is)
As I always dreamt it would be,
But not as I thought it be.

Proving my theoretics false,
But the metaphysics of it all true;
That you are of the soul,
and not of the mind.

Making Wittgenstein further accurate,
In his depiction of the human condition.
"The mystical is not how the world is,"
Said the Austrian taking a break for breath,
"But that it is."

A Blissful Bind

A cigarette perches on my lips
And there are no matches
To even consider,
Let alone to strike to light.

What’s more,
I can’t find the door out
I’m a permanent tenant
In this compartment complex
Where cognition litters the hallways.

I’ve tried other subjects:
Teachers and Foreign Policy
And even the old House
On Street Court East.

But a stanza is created
Only to be abandoned
Like a cresting lifeboat
In the arms of a merciless ocean.

I’m a paralytic of theme
As I cannot write
Unless its of you.

But this is the toll I pay
For following the ivory lines,
Along a coastline ever sinking.