The Heart of the Matter

John Valentine has a Ph.D. in philosophy from Vanderbilt University and taught at various colleges and universities for forty-six years, including the University of Alabama in Birmingham, East Georgia State College in Swainsboro, and the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). He retired from SCAD in 2022. He is the author of the book "Beginning Aesthetics: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Art" and numerous articles in philosophy journals. His poetry has been published in the chapbook "Close to the Fallen" and in "The Sewanee Review," "International Poetry Review," "The Midwest Quarterly," "Mudlark: An Electronic Journal of Poetry & Poetics," "Southern Poetry Review," "Snake Nation Review," and others. His poems attempt to capture moments of sudden illumination that reveal the interconnectivity of all beings. He has been influenced in this regard by Zen Buddhism and the literature of existentialism and also by William Blake's famous lines from "Auguries of Innocence": "To see a World in a Grain of Sand / And a Heaven in a Wild Flower / Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand / And Eternity in an hour . . . " Poetry is a dance between the universal and the singular, the one and the many. When we can suddenly intuit and grasp the dance, we come closer to empathy and appreciation for every life-form on our planet.