Letters from Gibran…

After Chinese class this morning in Beirut, I wandered past a dozen assault rifles carried by Internal Security forces on my stroll to the corner bookstore. The first book I spotted on the shelves was a collection of letters written by Khalil Gibran to the pianist Gertrude Barry. As army helicopters circled above, I opened to this letter:

Are you unhappy, my beloved Gertrude? I, too, am unhappy sometimes. There are days when bitterness mingles itself with life–life the only thing we possess to give as a price for the little wisdom attainable here. There are days when my dreams are dreams of hunger and my songs are sighs, and the things I try to create are sad, so very sad. And there are days when I want to be nothing but a shepherd somewhere on a far away mountain, or an unthought-of brother in an unknown convent, or an outcast in a lovely undiscovered island. And yet, my beloved, such days are beautiful because they reveal to us the truth of love; love the healer, love the only consoler, love the god.

We love, Gertrude, and we must not be unhappy. We are the children of light and let us not think of the shadow…