Pedagogy of the imagination: philo-poesis, non.verifiable truths, and other existent.ial celebrations

The central theme of this thesis is philo-poesis. The work engages the hearts of educators, speaks to a way of being in the world that calls us to attention, to an embodied awareness of the poetry that is our lives. Philo-poesis is a practice: an experiment in the alchemy of the imagining/thinking/embodied being. Philo-poesis requires active perception: a way of thinking and dreaming with the world, while at the same time cultivating the awareness of potentialities in the moment. Philo-poesis is a way of loving better—a love making between world and word. Thus a pedagogy of the imagination is born. This thesis is, first and foremost, an invitation to the reader to walk with the writer in the open field of philo-poesis. In the writing of this thesis I play, explore, evoke, provoke, invoke, enact, and live poetically in the midst of philosophy and philosophically in the midst of poetry. The poems in this thesis become the testimony for this play and presence. Philo-poesis requires the reader's participation: a way of walking back to a mind that is true to itself, a knowing that is purer and freer of possession and control, a way to restoration. The work is written and presented in a manner that includes the reader to participate with the writer in a kaleidoscopic world of poetry making where no pattern ever repeats the same way twice. Each turn of the kaleidoscope highlights some aspect and element of philo-poesis, and provokes the reader’s greater awareness and curiosity. These turns scatter in the open field of awe and wonder, exploring, and bursting into new beginnings and delight. Ultimately, philo-poesis is a state of mind, a more courteous way of being, a vehicle for transforming consciousness, a way of loosening our grip on the world to invite a more intimate connection with it. This connection and intimacy in turn create space for insight and revelation.