Issue nº 62

Love letters  |  Extracts from "The Prophet"

     Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931), born in the Lebanon, will be remembered for his classic "The Prophet," which sixty years after its publication is still on the list of best-sellers in several countries. In 1995 a Lebanese friend gave me a book containing the love letters exchanged between Gibran and Mary Haskell, an American ten years older than he was. When I read it I discovered a complex and fascinating man, which encouraged me to select some texts for the publication ("The Prophet's Love Letters," Ed. Ediouro). Everything indicates that Mary, although a great friend, never accepted any relationship beyond Platonic love. Reading Gibran's letters, it is difficult to understand how she resisted!
     Here are some fragments:

10/3/1912
     Mary, my adorable Mary, how can you feel that you are giving me more pain than joy? Nobody quite knows the border between pain and pleasure: I often think it is impossible to separate them. You give me so much joy that it hurts and you cause me so much pain that it even makes me smile.

24/5/1914
     Think, my adorable one, of us walking across a beautiful field one lovely day and all of a sudden a storm breaks out above our heads. How marvelous! Could there be any greater emotion than seeing the elements producing wild force and energy? Let's go to the fields, Mary, and seek the unexpected.

8/7/1914
     I have always thought that when someone understands us they end up enthralling us, since we will accept anything for the purpose of being understood. But your understanding has brought me the deepest peace and freedom that I have ever experienced. In the two hours that your visit lasted, you discovered a black spot in my heart and touched it and it has disappeared for ever - making me see my own light.

18/4/1915
     The two days we spent together were just magnificent. When we speak of the past we always make the present and future more real. For many years I was afraid to look at what I had lived, and suffered in silence. Today I realize that silence makes us suffer all the deeper.
     But you made me talk and I have discovered the things that lay hidden in dust in my soul, so now I can tear them out of there.

17/7/1915
     We two are trying to touch the limits of our existence. The great poets of the past always surrendered themselves to Life. They did not look for some determined thing, nor did they try to unveil secrets: they simply allowed their souls to be overwhelmed by emotions. People are always looking for security and sometimes they find it, but security is an end in itself, whereas Life has no end.
     Your letter, Mary, is the most beautiful expression of life that I have ever received. Poets are not those who write poetry, but rather those whose heart is full of the holy spirit of Love.

10/5/1916
     Dear Mary: I am sending you a parable that I have just finished. I have written little and that only in Arabic. But I would like to hear your corrections and suggestions on this piece:
     In the shadow a temple my friend pointed out a blind man. My friend said: "That is a wise man."
     We went up to him and I asked: "How long have you been blind?"
     "Ever since I was born."
     "I am an astronomer," I said.
     "I am too," answered the blind man. And placing his hand on his chest, he said: "I spend my life observing the many suns and stars that move inside me."