My letter to John Keats

My dear Keats,


In your last letter, you mentioned that you believe in the authenticity of imagination, as do I. Whatever one imagines is truth within them, and can change any situation for or against them. I believe thought holds great power over us mere mortals. What I must ask you, however, is if life were only one of sensation, would we not be the ones standing in the harshest of climates calling to our lovers, or speaking words that were meant only to be thought, acting on every impulse that consumed our beings? That world would be one that I would not dare to consider ideal. We also cannot rely on the idea that the minute that we stop dreaming, we will find our dreams in truth. Although Adam was fortunate enough to encounter such an experience, one cannot count on it. A great experimentalist, Max Planck, once staged an experiment with no substantiation for his ideas. He was accurate in his thinking, but not entirely, not until Albert Einstein modified them. So, you see? Impulse is unreliable.
I am one who analyzes situations closely, at times too closely. Oh, how I do wish I could act without thought! Just as the wind through the trees, rising and falling as they please. I can scarcely remember a single time in which I did what my heart and body told me to do, rather than my mind. How, may I ask, could you not feel the compulsion and inclination towards passion and affection during a whole week? Perhaps it is because you have experienced it once? I feel as if all of my passion and affection is stored away, never to be seen by the luminosity of the night. Although, feeling desire or not feeling desire, does not undermine the genuiness of what we feel in the least.
It intrigues me that you say, Every man has his speculations, but every Man does not brood and peacock over them till he makes a false coinage and deceives himself. These thoughts that we conjure out of false assumptions or misconceptions eventually seem to control our actions, and the way in which we interact with others. Are you saying here, that if man did not speculate, there would be no reason to brood? But then we would only know what is true, and never quite understand what it is we are observing or experiencing, whichever we choose to do at the time. I could not live that way.
You have written that poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one’s soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself – but with its subject. I believe that this is true in certain circumstances, but I also believe that in others, that poetry can startle and can catch you off of your guard. But, I do agree that poetry should always amaze you with its subject more so than itself. Nothing in poetry should ever be half way, but of course it is easier to say these things than to show them in writing. You also said that if poetry does not come naturally, it should not come at all and this is one point upon which I must disagree. If a person who has never written one poetic phrase down before decides that one day, that is how they will express themselves, then I fully support it, no matter how awful or uncomfortable it is. What is important, is that the person’s emotions are being expressed in one way or another.
Poetry does not come to any one person as leaves do to a tree. It is difficult to work with and it is something one must wrestle with every so often, but there are those lines that appear intermittently, as easily as the mirror reflects your image. You have every right to be skeptical, but it must be remembered that poetry affects each reader differently, based on that reader’s past experiences and thought processes, and some will simply be amused. It is good to know that you do not care to be in the right. The lines on one’s face begin to fade with that mindset.
On the subject of intelligence, knowledge is something that will continue to flow in as long as continues to think. An expansive knowledge decreases mystery, but I trust that there will always be some form of mystery, floating around us, fascinating and attractive. And please, keep me informed on what are behind the other doors in this large Mansion of Many Apartments. I am interested to know what you discover next.   
Yesterday, I was wondering about the Bermuda Triangle and began researching on my own about all of the strange occurrences that have taken place in that area. I was mesmerized, and could not hardly stop myself. I was getting pulled in, without any real knowledge of the reason why the things I read about, happened. But that is why I kept looking, and eventually came up with my own theory. The next day, my good friend Charles told me the exact scientific reason why people seem to disappear and appear there. At that moment, I lost all interest. Not that it was not interesting. If he had asked beforehand if I wanted the phenomena to be explained to me, I most likely would have said yes. But no matter – my curiosity faded and there was not a reason left to continue my search, for the answer was displayed before me like a meal on a tray.
I will leave you with this. In life, there should always remain a mystery. An answer should never be served as it was to me. It is meant to make people wonder, and by wondering, come up with their own ideas. If one solves a mystery on their own, they have still come to their own conclusion. If the unknown is resolved, people will stop looking. And you want people to be looking, do you not?

most sincerely,
a friend