Gibran Kahlil Gibran the poet

Gibran Khalil Gibran (1883-1931) was born in the Maronite family of Gibran in Bsharri, a mountainous area in Northern Lebanon. His mother Kamila Rahmeh was thirty when she gave birth to Gibran from her third husband Khalil Gibran, who proved to be an irresponsible husband leading the family to poverty and homelessness. When Gibran was eight years old the family went to live with relatives for a while; however, the strong-willed mother decided that the family should immigrate to the US, seeking a better life and following in suit to Gibran's uncle who immigrated earlier but his father being an irresponsible head of the family was undecided about immigration and remained behind in Lebanon. Gibran had a step-brother six years older than him called Peter and two younger sisters, Mariana and Sultana, whom he was deeply attached to throughout his life, along with his mother.  

Growing up in the lush region of Bsharri, Gibran proved to be a solitary and pensive child who relished the natural surroundings of the cascading falls, the rugged cliffs and the neighboring green cedars, the beauty of which emerged as a dramatic and symbolic influence to his drawings and writings. Being stricken with poverty, he did not receive any formal education or learning, which was limited to regular visits to a village priest who doctrined him with the essentials of religion and the Bible, alongside Syriac and Arabic languages. Recognizing Gibran's inquisitive and alert nature, the priest began teaching him the rudiments of alphabet and language, opening up to Gibran the world of history, science, and language. At the age of ten, Gibran fell off a cliff, wounding his left shoulder, which remained weak for the rest of his life ever since this incident.

Gibran entered school on September 30, 1895; merely two months after his arrival in the US. Gibran caught the eye of his teachers with his sketches and drawings, a hobby he had started during his childhood in Lebanon. In the school, a registration mistake altered his name forever by shortening it to Kahlil Gibran, which remained unchanged till the rest of his life despite repeated attempts at restoring his full name.  

In later life Kahlil Gibran emerged as the third best-selling poet of all time, just behind Shakespeare and Lao-Tzu. Some find Gibran's poetry preachy and moralizing, but I find it enlightening enough - it's hard to object to the melodic, cosmic of mysticism of a line like "That which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space."

I put some marvellous and inspiring quotes from Kahlil Gibran: "In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed". "When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy. When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight". "If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours. And if they don't, they never were". "Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars". "Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding". "Love... it surrounds every being and extends slowly to embrace all that shall be".

"I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet, strange, I am ungrateful to those teachers". "Yesterday is but today's memory, and tomorrow is today's dream". "Friendship is always a sweet responsibility, never an opportunity". "Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens". "Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit". "But let there be spaces in your togetherness and let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls". "Of life's two chief prizes, beauty and truth, I found the first in a loving heart and the second in a laborer's hand".  "Trust in dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity". "Your friend is your needs answered".

"March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection. March on, and fear not the thorns, or the sharp stones on life's path". "Generosity is giving more than you can, and pride is taking less than you need". "A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain"? "Faith is an oasis in the heart which will never be reached by the caravan of thinking". "We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them". "Art is a step from what is obvious and well-known toward what is arcane and concealed". "If your heart is a volcano, how shall you expect flowers to bloom"? "And ever has it been known that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation". "Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance".

He was not just a poet; he was one of the world's 10 leading writers if you look at the depth of the meaning of words. Several interesting jumps in his development, Christian, but Gibran became more of a universalistic after the meetings with 'Abdu'l-Bahá (and wrote things like "I love you when you bow in your mosque, kneel in your temple, pray in your church. For you and I are sons of one religion, and it is the spirit"). This should have occurred in the summer of 1912, since Abdu'l-Bahá arrived in New York City on April 11, 1912, after declining an offer of passage on the RMS Titanic, telling the Bahá'í believers, instead, to donate the money for the first class ticket to charity. It is not known what these two men from the same region of the world actually spoke about. But 'Abdu'l-Bahá's decision (or divine intervention) to not travel with Titanic led to a meeting that changed Gibran and his writing, as well as it allowed 'Abdu'l-Bahá to survive and make a sect to a new world religion.

Khalil Gibran says "My thought is a tender leaf that sways in every direction and finds pleasure in its swaying". His masterpiece - The Prophet - a book of poetic essays he began while still a youth in Lebanon is one of the most cherished books of our time and has sold millions of copies in more than twenty languages since its publication in 1923. But all of Gibran's works - essays, stories, parables, and prose poems - are imbued with equally powerful simplicity and wisdom. Perhaps no other twentieth-century writer has touched the hearts and minds of so remarkably varied and widespread a readership. In The Prophet he writes, "You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give". To end: "Yes, there is a Nirvanah; it is leading your sheep to a green pasture, and in putting your child to sleep, and in writing the last line of your poem."

The writer is a retired Professor of Economics, BCS General Education Cadre. Email: [email protected]