The hinge that held the beeswax in the mind;
As demonstrated by my sonnet from earlier in the week about minds exploding, I am currently taking a subject in my Masters course that is much more philosophical than anything I have done since undergraduate study. Today’s poem has been inspired by my reading of Wittgenstein and Descartes. It is perhaps more philosophical than my poetry often is; I hope that the result is, if not easy to understand, at least evocative. If neither, then I blame the philosophy that I’m having to read!
The hinge that held the beeswax in the mind;
The ladder upon which the learner climbs
And navigates what new worlds she may find –
Worlds where the certain falls and falls, sometimes
Revealing dull contrivances and rhymes.
The hinge that held the door firmly in place;
The wax which melts, reformulates in climes
Now hot, now cold; the mind which tries to trace
The shifts, the essence, all that it contains
And is contained within the words I am;
The vacuum and the Being which remains;
The truth that lingers when we lose the sham:
The hinge that holds the beeswax still in view;
The door, the soul, within the Me, the You.
The Consolations of Writing 
It’s hard to blend philosophy and poetry. I think you do it quite well here.
It brings to my mind Thomas Merton. Not that your writing is like his, but he also tried to blend philosophy/theology with poetry. Have you read Merton?
Thanks! I’ve never read Merton but I’ve heard of him and would like to check him out sometime. What would you recommend?
Well, I got quite caught up in all of it–I guess the last 5 lines, particularly. You really do fine work–God bless you.
Wow, thanks! I wasn’t really sure what I thought of it, so your encouragement’s much appreciated.
I love this, Matthew. A post on a blog I read yesterday, seemed to be expressing the view that philosophy is a ‘dead’ subject. I think philosophical thought is needed so much now – we need to become un-numbed.
Thanks! There’s definitely still a place for philosophy. Mind you, a lot of what I’ve been reading lately seems to make me more numb than un-numb me! But I’m loving Kierkegaard at the moment – he’s very refreshing to read, actually.
I’ll look him up.