Us for an hour, you croak and clamour merrily
Like the frogs of the water. And when we
Conquer you and subdue you for an Age, we
Remain as silent giants.
You crucified Jesus and stood below Him,
Blaspheming and mocking at Him; but at last
He came down and overcame the generations,
And walked among you as a hero, filling the
Universe with His glory and His beauty.
You poisoned Socrates and stoned Paul and
Destroyed Ali Talib and assassinated
Madhat Pasha, and yet those immortals are
With us forever before the face of Eternity.
But you live in the memory of man like
Corpses upon the face of the earth; and you
Cannot find a friend who will bury you in
The obscurity of non-existence and oblivion,
Which you sought on earth.
We are the sons of Sorrow, and sorrow is a
Rich cloud, showering the multitudes with
Knowledge and Truth. You are the sons of
Joy, and as high as your joy may reach,
By the Law of God it must be destroyed
Before the winds of heaven and dispersed
Into nothingness, for it is naught but a
Thin and wavering pillar of smoke.
THE HOUSE OF FORTUNE
MY WEARIED heart bade me farewell and left for the House of Fortune. As he reached that holy city which the soul had blessed and worshipped, he commenced wondering, for he could not find what he had always imagined would be there. The city was empty of power, money, and authority.
And my heart spoke to the daughter of Love saying, “Oh Love, where can I find Contentment? I heard that she had come here to join you.”
And the daughter of Love responded, “Contentment has already gone to preach her gospel in the city, where greed and corruption are paramount; we are not in need of her.”
Fortune craves not Contentment, for it is an earthly hope, and its desires are embraced by union with objects, while Contentment is naught but heartfelt.
The eternal soul is never contented; it ever seeks exaltation. Then my heart looked upon Life of Beauty and said, “Thou art all knowledge; enlighten me as to the mystery of Woman.” And he answered, “Oh human heart, woman is your own reflection, and whatever you are, she is; wherever you live, she lives; she is like religion if not interpreted by the ignorant, and like a moon, if not veiled with clouds, and like a breeze, if not poisoned with impurities.”
And my heart walked toward Knowledge, the daughter of Love and Beauty, and said, “Bestow upon me wisdom, that I might share it with the people.” And she responded, “Say not wisdom, but rather fortune, for real fortune comes not from outside, but begins in the Holy of Holies of life. Share of thyself with the people.”
TWO INFANTS
A PRINCE stood on the balcony of his palace addressing a great multitude summoned for the occasion and said, “Let me offer you and this whole fortunate country my congratulations upon the birth of a new prince who will carry the name of my noble family, and of whom you will be justly proud. He is the new bearer of a great and illustrious ancestry, and upon him depends the brilliant future of this realm. Sing and be merry!” The voices of the throngs, full of joy and thankfulness, flooded the sky with exhilarating song, welcoming the new tyrant who would affix the yoke of oppression to their necks by ruling the weak with bitter authority, and exploiting their bodies and killing their souls. For that destiny, the people were singing and drinking ecstatically to the health of the new Emir.
Another child entered life and that kingdom at the same time. While the crowds were glorifying the strong and belittling themselves by singing praise to a potential despot, and while the angels of heaven were weeping over the people’s weakness and servitude, a sick woman was thinking. She lived in an old, deserted hovel and, lying in her hard bed beside her newly-born infant wrapped with ragged swaddles, was starving to death. She was a penurious and miserable young wife neglected by humanity; her husband had fallen into the trap of death set by the prince’s oppression, leaving a solitary woman to whom God had sent, that night, a tiny companion to prevent her from working and sustaining life.
As the mass dispersed and silence was restored to the vicinity, the wretched woman placed the infant on her lap and looked into his face and wept as if she were to baptize him with tears. And with a hunger-weakened voice she spoke to the child saying, “Why have you left the spiritual world and come to share with me the bitterness of earthly life? Why have you deserted the angels and the spacious firmament and come to this miserable land of humans, filled with agony, oppression, and heartlessness? I have nothing to give you except tears; will you be nourished on tears instead of milk? I have no silk clothes to put on you; will my naked, shivering arms give you warmth? The little animals graze in the pasture and return safely to their shed; and the small birds pick the seeds and sleep placidly between the branches. But you, my beloved, have naught save a loving but destitute mother.”
Then she took the infant to her withered breast and clasped her arms around him as if wanting to join the two bodies in one, as before. She lifted her burning eyes slowly toward heaven and cried, “God! Have mercy on my unfortunate countrymen!”
At that moment the clouds floated from the face of the moon, whose beams penetrated the transom of that poor home and fell upon two corpses.
THE DAY OF MY BIRTH
IT WAS on this day of the year that my
Mother brought me into the world; on
This day, a quarter-century past, the
Great silence placed me between the arms
Of Existence, replete with lamentation
And tears and conflicts.
Twenty-five times have I encircled the
Blazing sun, and many times more has the
Moon encircled my smallness; yet, I have
Not learned the secrets of light, neither
Do I comprehend the mystery of darkness.
I have journeyed these twenty-five years
With the earth and the sun and the planets
Through the Supreme Infinite; yet, my soul
Yearns for understanding of the Eternal Law
As the hollow grotto reverberates with the
Echo of the waves of the sea, but never fills.
Life exists through the existence of the
Heavenly system, but is not aware of the
Unbounded might of the firmament; and the
Soul sings the praise of the ebb and flow
Of a heavenly melody, but does not perceive
Its meaning.
Twenty-five years past, the hand of Time
Recorded my being, and I am a living page
In the book of the universe; yet, I am now
But naught; but a vague word with meaning
Of complication symbolizing now nothing,
And then many things.
Meditations and memories, on this day of
Each year, congest my soul and halt the
Procession of life, revealing to me the
Phantoms of wasted nights, and sweeping
Them away as the great wind disperses the
Thin cloud from the horizon. And they
Vanish in the obscured corner of my hut
As the murmur of the narrow stream must
Vanish in the distant, broadened valley.
On this day of each year, the spirits
Which have fashioned my soul visit with
Me from all of Eternity and gather about
Me, chanting the sorrowful hymns of memories
Then they retreat swiftly and disappear
Behind the visible objects like a flock of
Birds descending upon a deserted threshing
Floor whereupon they find no seeds; they
Hover in disappointment and depart quickly
For a more
rewarding place.
On this day I meditate upon the past,
Whose purpose puzzles me in mind and
Confuses me in heart, and I look
Upon it as I look into a hazy mirror
In which I see naught but death-like
Countenances upon the past years.
As I gaze again, I see my own self
Staring upon my sorrowful self, and
I question Sorrow but find him mute.
Sorrow, if able to speak, would
Prove sweeter than the joy of song.
During my twenty-five years of life
I have loved many things, and often
I loved that which the people hated,
And loathed that which the people
Loved.
And that which I loved when I was a
Child, I still love, and shall continue
To love forevermore. The power to
Love is God’s greatest gift to man,
For it never will be taken from the
Blessed one who loves.
I love death, and entitle it with
Sweet names, and praise it with
Loving words, secretly and to the
Throngs of taunting listeners.
Although I have not renounced my great
Allegiance to death, I became deeply
Enamoured with life also, for life and
Death are equal to me in charm and
Sweetness and attraction, and they
Have joined hands in fostering in me
My longings and affections, and in
Sharing with me my love and suffering.
I love freedom, and my love for true
Freedom grew with my growing knowledge
Of the people’s surrender to slavery
And oppression and tyranny, and of
Their submission to the horrible idols
Erected by the past ages and polished
By the parched lips of the slaves.
But I love those slaves with my love
For freedom, for they blindly kissed
The jaws of ferocious beasts in calm
And blissful unawareness, feeling not
The venom of the smiling vipers, and
Unknowingly digging their graves with
Their own fingers.
My love for freedom is my greatest love,
For I have found it to be a lovely
Maiden, trailed by aloneness and
Withered by solitude until she became
As a spectre wandering in the midst
Of the dwellings unrecognized and
Unwelcome, and stopping by the waysides
And calling to the wayfarers who did
Not offer heed.
During this score and five years I have
Loved happiness as all men love happiness.
I was in constant search of her but did
Not find her in man’s pathway; nor did
I observe the imprints of her footsteps
Upon the sand before man’s palaces;
Neither did I hear the echo of her voice
From the windows of man’s temples.
I sought happiness in my solitude, and
As I drew close to her I heard my soul
Whisper into my heart, saying, “The
Happiness you seek is a virgin, born
And reared in the depths of each heart,
And she emerges not from her birthplace.”
And when I opened my heart to find her,
I discovered in its domain only her
Mirror and her cradle and her raiment,
And happiness was not there.
I love mankind and I love equally all
Three human kinds … the one who
Blasphemes life, the one who blesses
It, and the one who meditates upon it.
I love the first for his misery and
The second for his generosity and the
Third for his perception and peace.
Thus, with love, did five and twenty
Years race into nothingness, and thus
Swiftly sped the days and the nights,
Falling from the roadway of my life
And fluttering away like the drying
Leaves of the trees before the winds of
Autumn.
Today I stopped on my road, like the
Weary traveler who has not reached his
Destination but seeks to ascertain his
Position. I look in every direction, but
Cannot find trace of any part of my past
At which I might point and say, “This is
Mine!”
Nor can I reap harvest from the seasons
Of my years, for my bins boast only
These parchments upon which the black
Ink is traced, and these paintings,
Upon which appear simple lines and colours.
With these papers and pictures I have
Succeeded only in shrouding and burying
My love and my thoughts and my dreams,
Even as the sower buries the seeds in
The heart of the earth.
But when the sower sows the seeds in
The heart of the earth he returns home
At eventide, hoping and waiting for
The day of harvest; but I have sown
The inner seeds of my heart in despair,
And hoping and waiting are in vain.
And now, since I have made my five and
Twenty journeys about the sun, I look
Upon the past from behind a deep veil
Of sighs and sorrows, and the silent
Future enlightens itself to me only
Through the sad lamp of the past.
I stare at the universe through the
Transom of my hut and behold the faces
Of men, and hear their voices rise into
Space and hear their footsteps falling
Into the stones; and I perceive the
Revelations of their spirits and the
Vibrations of their desires and the
Throbbings of their hearts.
And I see the children, running and
Laughing and playing and crying; and
I observe the youth walking with their
Heads lifted upward as if reading and
Singing the Kaseeda of youth between
The margins of their eyes, lined with
The radiant rays of the sun.
And I behold the maidens, who are walking
Gracefully and swaying like tender
Branches, and smiling like flowers, and
Gazing upon the youths from behind the
Quivering eyes of love.
And I see the aged walking slowly with
Bent backs, leaning upon their walking
Staffs, staring at the earth as though
Seeking there a treasure lost in youth.
I observe these images and phantoms
Moving and crawling in the paths and
Roadways of the city.
Then I look beyond the city and meditate
Upon the wilderness and its revered
Beauty and its speaking silence; its
Knolls and valleys and lofty trees; its
Fragrant flowers and brisk brooks and
Singing birds.
Then I look beyond the wilderness and
Contemplate the sea with all the magical
Wonders and secrets of its depths, and
The foaming and raging waves of its
Surface. The depths are calm.
Then I gaze beyond the ocean and see the
Infinite sky with its glittering stars;
And its suns and moons and planets; its
Gigantic forces and its myriad elements
That comply unerringly with a great
Law possessing neither a beginning nor
An ending.
Upon these things I ponder from between
My walls, forgetting my twenty-five
Years and all the years which preceded
Them and all the centuries to come.
At this moment my own existence and
All of my environs seem as the weak
Sigh of a small child trembling in the
Deep and eternal emptiness of a supreme
And boundless space.
But this insignificant entity …
This self which is myself, and whose
Motion and clamour I hear constantly,
Is now lifting strengthening wings
Toward the spacious firmament,
Extending hands in all directions,
Swaying and shivering upon this day
Which brought me into life, and life
Into me.
And then a tremendous voice arises
From the Holy of Holies within me,
Saying, “Peace be with you, Life!
Peace be with you, Awakening!
Peace be with you, Revelation!
“Peace be with you, oh Day, who
Engulfs the darkness of the earth
With thy brilliant light!
“Peace be with you, oh Night,
Through whose darkness the lights
Of heaven sparkle!
“Peace be with you, Seasons of the
Year!
Peace be with you, Spring, who
Restores the earth to youth!
Peace be with you, Summer, who
Heralds the glory of the sun!
Peace be with you, Autumn, who
Gives with joy the fruits of
Labour and the harvest of toil!
Peace be with you, Winter, whose
Rage and tempest restore to
Nature her sleeping strength!
“Peace be with you, Years, who
Reveal what the years concealed!
Peace be with you, Ages, who
Build what the ages destroyed!
Peace be with you, Time, who leads
Us to the fullness of death!
Peace be with you, Heart, who
Throbs in peace while submerged
In tears!
Peace be with you, Lips, who
Utter joyous words of salaam while
Tasting the gall and the vinegar
Of life!
Peace be with you, Soul, who
Directs the rudder of life and
Death while hidden from us
Behind the curtain of the sun!”
THE CRIMINAL
A YOUNG man of strong body, weakened by hunger, sat on the walker’s portion of the street stretching his hand toward all who passed, begging and repeating the sad song of his defeat in life, while suffering from hunger and from humiliation.
The Treasured Writings of Kahlil Gibran Page 8
