*by Kahlil Gibran* >And a poet said, "Speak to us of Beauty." > >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? > >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." > >At night the watchmen of the city say, "Beauty shall rise with the dawn from the east." > >And at noontide the toilers and the wayfarers say, "we have seen her leaning over the earth from the windows of the sunset." > >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." > >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 sap within the furrowed bark, nor a wing attached to a claw, > >But rather a garden forever in bloom and a flock of angels for ever in flight. > >People of Orphalese, 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.