I was browsing OkCupid (a next-gen dating site) and I came across this hilariosly pretentious girl living a few miles from me. You know, the kind of girl that thinks she's smarter than the world because she's read a few books. Now, before I go any further, I should mention that I harbor no feelings for her - whether of attraction or disdain. It's just that her profile strikes a funnybone for me. A funnybone that relates directly to some of my work on this site. You see, she states explicitly in her profile that she doesn't want so much as a sniff from a guy that can't keep up with her intellectually. She then goes on to say that her favorite philosopher is Khalil Gibran.

Now I know Khalil Gibran. I've read him and I've loved him. But, friends and neighbors, by no means is Khalil Gibran a philosopher.

He is a poet of the first order. Gibran has an amazing talent for describing the world as it appears to an enlightened observer. His books have this magical quality that transports you right into the thick of things. You feel as if every word is a certainty.

He does not attempt to build a structure that explains the numerous forces and motivations of our world. That's a philosopher's job. What Gibran does is to strip the reader of preconceptions, and throw them thus unclothed into a suddenly foreign world. He offers a few rules to navigate within it, but the exploration he leaves to us.

This is the job of a poet, I think: to strip a reader bare and then let them come to their own conclusions.

The written word is a wonderful medium for discovery of the world and the self. My hat goes off to Gibran. I hope to find through my writings something similar to what he found through his.