The Prophet

by Kahlil Gibran

These things he said in words. But much in his heart remained unsaid. For he himself could not speak his deeper secret.

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.

There are those who give little of the much which they have — and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome. And there are those who have little and give it all. These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.

It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding;

You often say, “I would give, but only to the deserving.” The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture. They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.

Setiap ketemu pengemis & pengamen aku sering bandingin siapa dari mereka yang lebih berhak menerima sedekahku yang tak seberapa. Seringnya? pengamen karena tampak dari usaha mereka untuk menggerakkan lidah dan memetik senar. "Aku pengen sedekah ke mereka yang niat mencari dan berusaha aja" prinsipku. Padahal alam belum pernah sepilihkasih itu ke manusia walau sebagian mereka belum pernah berkontribusi menanam pohon untuk dihirup oksigennya kembali oleh mereka. Hewan ternak tak pernah pilih kasih untuk berusaha menjadi "daging yang lebih empuk" untuk kemudian bisa kita lahap di kemudian hari. Baris "...for to withhold is to perish" cukup membuatku mengonstruksi prinsip recehku kembali. Biarlah yang memberi keadilan yang sepantasnya cukup Yang Diatas semata. Yang ada di ranahku? cukup memberi tanpa pandang bulu.

But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth’s furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born, And in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life, And to love life through labour is to be intimate with life’s inmost secret.

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.

Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral.

Your clothes conceal much of your beauty, yet they hide not the unbeautiful.

It is in exchanging the gifts of the earth that you shall find abundance and be satisfied. Yet unless the exchange be in love and kindly justice, it will but lead some to greed and others to hunger.

Man’s needs change, but not his love, nor his desire that his love should satisfy his needs.

You have been told that, even like a chain, you are as weak as your weakest link. This is but half the truth. You are also as strong as your strongest link. To measure you by your smallest deed is to reckon the power of ocean by the frailty of its foam. To judge you by your failures is to cast blame upon the seasons for their inconstancy.

Forget not that I shall come back to you.

It was but yesterday we met in a dream. You have sung to me in my aloneness, and I of your longings have built a tower in the sky. But now our sleep has fled and our dream is over, and it is no longer dawn.