 Susman understands the symbol thus as a poetic means of expressing diversity rather than uniform unity. The symbol allows for the expression of the individual’s incommensurability in a language in which the word’s fecundity produces the poetic experience. Poetry is transformative because it uses language abstractly as well as in a concrete manner. This unique combination is for Susman what defines its symbolic use (1910: 23f.). The development of modern poetry consists in this process of symbolizing the modern experience, a process iterated in the articulations of the diversity of lyrical I’s it brings forth. As a result, poetry must be understood as performing a philosophically critical task, a task that Susman describes in terms that can be read as summarizing Simmel’s thought succinctly: “Form presents existence for us. To form means to give the things their existence for us” (1910: 91).