This is an excerpt from The Forerunner by Kahlil Gibran, discovered in the anthology of his work called The Voice of Kahlil Gibran.
Four poets were sitting around a bowl of punch that stood on a table.
Said the first poet, ‘Methinks I see with my third eye the fragrance of this wine hovering in space like a cloud of birds in an enchanted forest.’
The second poet raised his head and said, ‘With my inner ear I can hear those mist-birds singing. And the melody holds my heart as the white rose imprisons the bee within her petals.’
The third poet closed his eyes and stretched his arm upwards, and said, ‘I touch them with my hand. I feel their wings, like the breath of a sleeping fairy, brushing against my fingers.’
Then the fourth poet rose and lifted up the bowl, and he said, ‘Alas, friends! I am too dull of sight and of hearing and of touch. I cannot see the fragrance of this wine, nor hear its song, nor feel the beating of its wings. I perceive but the wine itself. Now therefore must I drink it, that it may sharpen my senses and raise me to your blissful heights.’
And putting the bowl to his lips, he drank the punch to the very last drop.
The three poets, with their mouths open, looked at him aghast, and there was a thirsty, yet unlyrical hatred in their eyes.
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Book Summary
Here are the book summaries from Goodreads, for both The Forerunner and The Voice of Kahlil Gibran:
Millions all over the world have responded to the message of Kahlil Gibrana as recorded in his masterpiece, “The Prophet”. In the style that gave Gibran the title of “Dante of the Twentieth Century”, “The Voice of the Master” speaks stirringly of the victory of faith over grief, and love over loneliness. “Of Marriage”, “Of the Divinity of Man”, “Of Reason and Knowledge”, “Of Love and Equality”, –these are some of the themes Gibran searches in this volume, offering fresh insight into many of life’s most perplexing riddles.
This selection and introduction copyright © Robin Waterfield 1995.
More details on Goodreads can be found here.
“I do not think the East has spoken with so beautiful a voice since the Gitanjali of Rabindranath Tagore …”
– G. W. Russell
“Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese poet, philosopher and painter, occupies a unique position in today’s world. His name is synonymous with peace, spiritual values and international understanding.”
Copyright © 1900 by Kahlil Gibran.
More details on Goodreads can be found here.
