How do atheists do life?

[vulcanlogician]

For the most part I get my philosophy through literature, I guess.

I'm not a huge literature guy. I like Tolstoy and Kafka for its philosophic value. Especially Kafka; "The Hunger Artist" makes a pretty profound statement about meaningfulness in one's life (on par with Sartre). "The Metamorphosis"- a classic. One of my favorite short stories ever. Other than those two, though, I usually get my philosophy from philosophers.

My main focus for a long time was the work of William Blake, who was a great thinker. Really second only to Dante as poet-philosopher.

When I was younger I liked Kahlil Gibran. He's sometimes called "the American Blake" (even though he was Lebanese). I think he is a great philosopher/poet for, say, tennagers to get into. He was influenced by Nietzsche, and it shows. I'd characterize him as a "theistic Nietzsche"-- which is perhaps why (given what you said) people call him "the American Blake." Once you read Plato, Gibran won't offer you much in the way of profundity... but he's a beautiful poet nonetheless.

I always liked Ginsberg and Whitman as far as poets go. Emerson too. You like Emerson at all?

A good friend of mine loves Dante. She tried to get me to read him, but I was a little lost not too far into the Inferno. Perhaps I should give it another shot, being a little more proficient with difficult works than I was then. In any case, this particular friend is a very special person. If she likes Dante, there must be something there. I'm not opposed to giving Blake a looking-over either. I would guess he's a bit more approachable than Dante, but I'm not that familiar with either of them.

Once you've worked on Blake, you come back to the Bible (which he called "the great code of art") and all the objections to it that the naive atheists make seem irrelevant.

If you say so. It's tough for me to get into the Bible as literature. Perhaps Ecclesiastes has some value in that department. And Paul can certainly wax poetic. Too bad he so often punctuates his poetic moments with bigoted tirades. I wonder if you aren't simply admiring the Bible "through Blake's lens."

I'm reminded of a poem I heard in San Francisco called "Ode to a Piece of Shit." This particular poet happened upon a piece of shit lain upon the sidewalk outside of his apartment and composed a poem about it in the style of Neruda. It was a rather beautiful poem, despite its title. Perhaps anything, no matter how foul and contemptible, can be made beautiful when portrayed in verse by a skilled and visionary poet.