The article deals with the relationship between metaphor and discourse. The metaphor is characterized as the main element of discourse. In the analysis, the emphasis is on its understanding by Bakhtin, when the discourse appears as a “whole utterance”, as a “unit of verbal communication”, which has not meaning, but “meaning related to value – truth, beauty, etc. – and requires a reciprocal understanding which includes an assessment.” According to these positions, on the material of Pushkin’s “The Bronze Horseman”, the works of S. Dovlatov, the works of P. Florensky and others it is proved that the metaphor is a living phenomenon, that “metaphor is a paradigm,” it, “like rapids on a river, makes the recipient's mind boil” (P. Ricoeur). A metaphor is examined as a means of enriching the productivity of philosophical thinking, and it can be a “body of philosophy” (T. Adorno).