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And a poet said, Speak to us of beauty.
And he answered:
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Where shall you
seek beauty, and how shall you find her unless
she herself be your way and your guide? And
how shall you speak of her except she be the
weaver of your speech?
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The aggrieved
and the injured say, "Beauty is kind and gentle.
Like a young mother half shy of her own glory she
walks among us."
And the passionate say, "Nay, beauty is a thing
of might and dread. Like the tempest she shakes
the earth beneath us and the sky above us."
The tired and the weary say, "Beauty is of soft whisperings. She
speaks in our spirit. Her voice yields to our silences like a faint
light that quivers in fear of the shadow."
But the restless say, "We have heard her shouting among the mountains,
And with her cries came the sound of hoofs, and the beating of
wings and the roaring of lions."
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At night the watchmen
of the city say, "Beauty shall rise with the dawn
from the east."
And at the noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say, "We have seen
her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset."
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In winter say the snow-bound, "She
shall come with the spring leaping upon the hills."
And in the summer heat the reapers say, "We have seen her dancing
with the autumn leaves, and we saw a drift of snow in her hair."
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All these things have
you said of beauty, Yet in truth you spoke not
of her but of needs unsatisfied, And beauty is
not a
need but an ecstasy.
It is not a mouth thirsting nor an empty hand
stretched forth, but rather a heart enflamed
and a soul enchanted.
It is not the image you would see nor the song you would
hear, but rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a song you
hear though you shut your ears.
It is not the snap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing
attached to a claw, but rather a garden for ever in bloom and a flock of angels
for
ever in flight.
People of Ophalese, beauty is life when life unveils
her holy face, but you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.
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From: The Prophet
by Kahlil Gibran
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