wings1

BROKEN WINGS

ENTRANCE TO THE SHRINE In a few days, loneliness overcame me; and I tired of the grim faces of
books; I hired a carriage and started for the house of Farris Effandi. As i reached
the pine woods where people went for picnics, the driver took a private way,
shaded with willow trees on each side. Passing through , we could see the beauty
of the green grass, the grapevines, and the many colored flowers of Nisan just
blossoming.
n a few minutes the carriage stopped before a solitary house in the midst of a
beautiful garden. The scent of roses, gardenia, and jasmine filled the air. As I
dismounted and entered the spacious garden, I saw Farris Effandi coming to
meet me. He ushered me into his house with a hearty welcome and sat by me,
like a happy father when he sees his son, showering me with questions on my
life, future and education. I answered him, my voice full of ambition and zeal; for I
heard ringing in my ears the hymn of glory, and I was sailing the calm sea of
hopeful dreams. Just then a beautiful young woman, dressed in a gorgeous white
silk gown, appeared from behind the velvet curtains of the door and walked
toward me. Farris Effandi and I rose from our seats.
his is my daughter Selma," said the old man. Then he introduced me to her,
saying, "Fate has brought back to me a dear old friend of mine in the person of
his son." Selma stared at me a moment as if doubting that a visitor could have
entered their house. Her hand, when I touched it, was like a white lily, and a
strange pang pierced my heart.
e all sat silent as if Selma had brought into the room with her heavenly
spirit worthy of mute respect. As she felt the silence she smiled at me and said,"
Many a times my father has repeated to me the stories of his youth and of the old
days he and your father spent together. If your father spoke to you in the same
way, then this meeting is not the first one between us."
he old man was delighted to hear his daughter talking in such a manner and
said, "Selma is very sentimental. She sees everything through the eyes of the
spirit." Then he resumed his conversation with care and tact as if he had found in
me a magic which took him on the wings of memory to the days of the past.
s I considered him, dreaming of my own later years, he looked upon me, as
a lofty old tree that has withstood storms and sunshine throws its shadow upon a
small sapling which shakes before the breeze of dawn.
ut Selma was silent. Occasionally, she looked first at me and then at her
father as if reading the first and last chapters of life's drama. The day passed
faster in that garden, and I could see through the window the ghostly yellow kiss
of sunset on the mountains of Lebanon. Farris Effandi continued to recount his
experiences and I listened entranced and responded with such enthusiasm that
his sorrow was changed to happiness.
Selma sat by the window, looking on with sorrowful eyes and not speaking,
although beauty has its own heavenly language, loftier thant he voices of tongues
and lips. It is a timeless language, common to all humanity, a calm lake that
attracts the singing rivulets to its depth and makes them silent.
only our spirits can understand beauty, or live and grow with it. It puzzles
our minds; we are unable to describe it in words; it is a sensation that our eyes
cannot see, derived from both the one who observes and the one who is looked
upon. Real beauty is a ray which emanates from the holy of holies of the spirit,
and illuminates the body, as life comes from the depths of the earth and gives
color and scent to a flower.
real beauty lies in the spiritual accord that is called love which can exist
between a man and a woman.
id my spirit and Selma's reach out to eaach other that day when we met, and
did that yearning make me see her as the most beautiful woman under the sun? Or
was I intoxicated with the wine of youth which made me fancy that which never
existed.?
id my youth blind my natural eyes and make me imagine the brightness of
her eyes, the sweetness of her mouth, and the grace of her figure? Or was it that
her brightness, sweetness, and grace opened my eyes and showed me the
happiness and sorrow of love?
t is hard to answer these questions, but I say truly that in that hour I felt an
emotion that I had never felt before, a new affection resting calmly in my heart,
like the spirit hovering over the waters at the creation of the world, and from that
affection was born my happiness and my sorrow. Thus ended the hour of my
first meeting with Selma, and thus the will of Heaven freed me from the bondage
of youth and solitude and let me walk in the procession of love.
love is the only freedom in the world because it so elevates the spirit that the
laws of humanity and the phenomena of nature do not alter its course.
s I rose from my seat to depart, Farris Effandi came close to me and said
soberly, "Now my son, since you know your way to this house, you should
come often and feel that you are coming to your father's house. Consider me as
a father and Selma as a sister." Saying this, he turned to Selma as if to ask
confirmation of his statement. She nodded her head positively and then looked at
me as one who has found an old acquaintance.
hose words uttered by Farris Effandi Karamy placed me side by side with
his daughter at the altar of love. Those words were a heavenly song which started
with exaltation and ended with sorrow; they raised our spirits to the realm of light
and searing flame; they were the cup from which we drank happiness and
bitterness.
left the house. The old man accompanied me to the edge of the garden,
while my heart throbbed like the trembling lips of a thirsty man.

THE WHITE TORCH The month of Nisan had nearly passed. I continued to visit the home of
Farris Effendi and to meet Selma in that beautiful garden, gazing upon her beauty,
marveling at her intelligence, and hearing the stillness of sorrow. I felt an invisible
hand drawing me to her.
very visit gave me a new meaning to her beauty and a new insight into her
sweet spirit, Until she became a book whose pages I could understand and whose
praises I could sing, but which I could never finish reading. A woman whom
Providence has provided with beauty of spirit and body is a truth, at the same time
both open and secret, which we can understand only by love, and touch only by
virtue; and when we attempt to describe such a woman she disappears like vapor.
elma Karamy had bodily and spiritual beauty, but how can I describe her to
one who never knew her? Can a dead man remember the singing of a nightingale
and the frangrance of a rose and the sigh of a brook? Can a prisoner who is
heavily loaded with shackles follow the breeze of the dawn? Is not silence more
painful than death? Does pride prevent me from descibing Selma in plain words
since I cannot draw her truthfully with luminous colors? A hungryman in a desert
will not refuse to eat dry bread if Heaven does not shower him with manna and
quails.
n her white silk dress, Selma was slender as a ray of moonlight coming
through the window. She walked gracefully and rhythmically. Her voice was low
and sweet; words fell from her lips like drops of dew falling from the petals of
flowers when they are disturbed by the wind.
ut Selma's face! No words can descibe its expression, reflecting first great
internal suffering, then heavenly exaltation.
he beauty of Selma's face was not classic; it was like a dream of revalation
which cannot be measured or bound or copied by the brush of a painter or the
chisel of a sculptor. Selma's beauty was not in her golden hair, but in the virtue of
purity which surrounded it; not in her large eyes, but in the light which emanated
from them; not in her red lips, but in the sweetness of her words; not in her ivory
neck, but in its slight bow to the front. Nor was it in her perfect figure, but in the
nobility of her spirit, burning like a white torch between earth and sky. her beauty
was like a gift of poetry. But poets care unhappy people, for, no matter how high
their spirits reach, they will still be enclosed in an envelope of tears.
elma was deeply thoughtful rather than talkative, and her silence was a kind
of music that carried one to a world of dreams and made him listen to the
throbbing of his heart, and see the ghosts of his thoughts and feelings standing
before him, looking him in the eyes.
he wore a cloak of deep sorrow through her life, which increased her
strange beauty and dignity, as a tree in blossom is more lovely when seen through
the mist of dawn.
orrow linked her spirit and mine, as if each saw in the other's face what the
heart was feeling and heard the echo of a hidden voice. God had made two bodies
in one, and separation could be nothing but agony.
he sorrowful spirit finds reast when united with a similar one. They join
affectionately, as a stranger is cheered when he sees another stranger in a strange
land. Hearts that are united through the medium of sorrow will not be separated by
the glory of happiness. Love that is cleansed by tears will remain externaly pure
and beautiful.

THE TEMPEST

One day Farris Effandi invited me to dinner at his home. I accepted, my spirit
hungry for the divine bread which Heaven placed in the hands of Selma, the
spiritual bread which makes our hearts hungrier the more we eat of it. It was this
bread which Kais, the Arabian poet, Dante, and Sappho tasted and which set
their hearts afar; the bread which the Goddess prepares with the sweetness of
kisses and the bitterness of tears.
s I reached the home of Farris Effandi, I saw Selma sitting on a bench in the
garden resting her head against a tree and looking like a bride in her white silk
dress, or like a sentinel guarding that place.
ilently and reverently I approached and sat by her. I could not talk; so I
resorted to silence, the only language of the heart, but I felt that Selma was
listening to my wordless call and watching the ghost of my soul in my eyes.
n a few minutes the old man came out and greeted me as usual. When he
stretched his hand toward me, I felt as if he were blessing the secrets that united
me and his daughter. Then he said, "Dinner is ready, my children; let us eat. "We
rose and followed him, and Selma's eyes brightened; for a new sentiment had been
added to her love by her father's calling us his children.
e sat at the table enjoying the food and sipping the old wine, but our souls
were living in a world far away. We were dreaming of the future and its hardships.
hree persons were separated in thoughts, but united in love; three innocent
people with much feeling but little knowledge; a drama was being performed by an
old man who loved his daughter and cared for her happiness, a young woman of
twenty looking into the future with anxiety, and a young man, dreaming and
worrying, who had tasted neither the wine of life nor its vinegar, and trying to
reach the height of love and knowledge but unable to life himself up. We three
sitting in twilight were eating and drinking in that solitary home, guarded by
Heaven's eyes, but at the bottoms of our glasses were hidden bitterness and
anguish.
As we finished eating, one of the maids announced the presence of a man at
the door who wished to see Farris Effandi. "Who is he?" asked the old man. "The
Bishop's messanger," said the maid. There was a moment of silence during which
Farris Effandi stared at his daughter like a prophet who gazes at Heaven to divine
its secret. Then he said to the maid, "Let the man in."
s the maid left, a man, dressed in oriental uniform and with big mustache
curled at the ends, entered and greeted the old man, saying "His Grace, the
Bishop, has sent me for you with his private carriage; he wishes to discuss
important business with you." The old man's face clouded and his smile
disappeared. After a moment of deep thought he came close to me and said in a
friendly voice, "I hope to find you here when I come back, for Selma will enjoy
your company in this solitary place."
aying this, he turned to Selma and, smiling, asked if she agreed. She nodded
her head, but her cheeks became red, and with a voice sweeter than the music of
the lyre she said, "I will do my best, Father, to make our guest happy."
elma watched the carriage that had taken her father and the Bishop's
messenger until it disapperaed. Then she came and sat opposite me on a divan
covered with green silk. She looked like a lily bent to the carpet of green grass by
the breeze of dawn. It was the will of Heaven that I should be with Selma alone, at
night, in her beautiful home surrounded by trees, where silence, love, beauty and
virtue dewlt together.
e were both silent, each waiting for the other to speak, but speech is not the
only means of understanding between two souls. It is not the syllables that come
from the lips and tongues that bring hearts together.
here is something greater and purer than what the mouth utters. Silence
illuminates our souls, whispers to our hearts, and brings them together. Silence
separates us from ourselves, makes us sail the firmament of spirit, and brings us
closer to Heaven; it makes us feel that bodies are no more than prisons and that
this world is only a place of exile.
elma looked at me and her eyes revealed the secret of her heart. Then she
quietly said, "Let us go to the garden and sit under the trees and watch the moon
come up behind the mountains." Obediently I rose from my seat, but I hesitated.
on't you think we had better stay here until the moon has risen and illuminates
the garden?" And I continued, "The darkness hides the trees and flowers. We can
see nothing."
hen she said, "If darkness hides the trees and flowers from our eyes, it will
not hide love from our hearts."
ttering these words in a strange tone, she turned her eyes and looked through
the window. I remained silent, pondering her words, weighing the true meaning of
each syllable. Then she looked at me as if she regretted what she had said and
tried to take away those words from my ears by the magic of her eyes. But those
eyes, instead of making me forget what she had said, repeated through the depths
of my heart more clearly and effectively the sweet words which had already
become graven in my memory for eternity.
very beauty and greatness in this world is created by a single thought or
emotion inside a man. Every thing we see today, made by past generation, was,
before its appearance, a thought in the mind of a man or an impulse in the heart of
a woman. The revolutions that shed so much blood and turned men's minds
toward liberty were th idea of one man who lived in the midst of thousands of
men. The devastating wars which destroyed empires were a thought that existed in
the mind of an individual. The supreme teachings that changed the course of
humanity were the ideas of a man whose genius separated him from his
environment. A single thought build the Pyramids, founded the glory of Islam, and
caused the burning of the library at Alexandria.
ne thought will come to you at night which will elevate you to glory or lead
you to asylum. One look from a woman's eye makes you the happiest man in the
world. One word from a man's lips will make you rich or poor.
hat word which Selma uttered that night arrested me between my past and
future, as a boat which is anchored in the midst of the ocean. That word awakened
me from the slumber of youth and solitude and set me on the stage where life and
death play their parts.
he scent of flowers mingled with the breeze as we came into the garden and
sat silently on a bench near a jasmine tree, listening to the breathing of sleeping
nature, while in the blue sky the eyes of heaven witnessed our drama.
he moon came out from behind Mount Sunnin and shone over the coast,
hills, and mountains; and we could see the villages fringing the valley like
apparitions which have suddenly been conjured from nothing. We could see the
beauty of Lebanon under the silver rays of the moon.
oets of the West think of Lebanon as a legendary place, forgotten since the
passing of David and Solomon and the Prophets, as the Garden of Eden became
lost after the fall of Adam and Eve. To those Western poets, the word "Lebanon"
is a poetical expression associated with a mountain whose sides are drenched with
the incense of the Holy Cedars. It reminds them of the temples of copper and
marble standing stern and impregnable and of a herd of deer feeding in the valleys.
That night I saw Lebanon dream-like with the eyes of a poet.
hus, the appearance of things changes according to the emotions, and thus
we see magic and beauty in them, while the magic and beauty are really in
ourselves.
s the rays of the moon shone on the face, neck, and arms of Selma, she
looked like a statue of ivory sculptured by the fingers of some worshiper of Ishtar,
goddess of beauty and love. As she looked at me, she said, "Why are you silent?
Why do you not tell me something about your past?" As I gazed at her, my
muteness vanished, and I opened my lips and said, "Did you not hear what I said
when we came to this orchard? The spirit that hears the whispering of flowers and
the singing of silence can also hear the shrieking of my soul and the clamour of my
heart."
he covered her face with her hands and said in a trrembling voice, "Yes, I
heard you -- I heard a voice coming from the bosom of night and a clamor raging
in the heart of the day."
orgetting my past, my very existence -- everything but Selma -- I answered
her, saying, "And I heard you, too, Selma. I heard exhilarating music pulsing in the
air and causing the whole universe to tremble."
pon hearing these words, she closed her eyes and her lips I saw a smile of
pleasure mingled with sadness. She whispered softly, "Now I know that there is
something higher than heaven and deeper than the ocean and stranger than life and
death and time. I know now what I did not know before."
t that moment Selma became dearer than a friend and closer than a sister and
more beloved than a sweetheart. She became a supreme thought, a beautiful, an
overpowering emotion living in my spirit.
It is wrong to think that love comes from long companionship and
persevering courtship. Love is the offspring of spiritual affinity and unless that
affinity is created in a moment, it will not be created in years or even generations.
Then Selma raised her head and gazed at the horizon where Mount Sunnin
meets the sky, and said, "Yesterday you were like a brother to me, with whom I
lived and by whom I sat calmly under my father's care. Now, I feel the presence of
something stranger and sweeter than brotherly affection, an unfamiliar
commingling of love and fear that fills my heart with sorrow and happiness."
responded, "This emotion which we fear and which shakes us when it passes
through our hearts is the law of nature that guides the moon around the earth and
the sun around the God."
he put her hand on my head and wove her fingers throught my hair. Her
face brightened and tears came out of her eyes like drops of dew on the leaves of
a lily, and she said, "Who would believe our story -- who would believe that in this
hour we have surmounted the obstacles of doubt? Who would believe that the
month of Nisan which brought us together for the first time, is the month that
halted us in the Holy of Holies of life?"
er hand was still on my head as she spoke, and I would not have preferred a
royal crown or a wreath of glory to that beautiful smooth hand whose fingers were
twined in my hair.
hen I answered her: "People will not believe our story because they do not
know what love is the only flower that grows and blossoms without the aid of
seasons, but was it Nisan that brought us together for the first time, and is it this
hour that has arrested us in the Holy of Holies of life? Is it not the hand of God
that brought our souls close together before birth and made us prisoners of each
other for all the days and nights? Man's life does not commence in the womb and
never ends in the grave; and this firmament, full of moonlight and stars, is not
deserted by loving souls and intuitive spirits."
s she drew her hand away from my head, I felt a kind of electrical vibration at
the roots of my hair mingled with the night breeze. Like a devoted worshiper who
receives his blessing by kissing the altar in a shirne, I took Selma's hand, placed
my burning lips on it, and gave it a long kiss, the memory of which melts my heart
and awakens by its sweetness all the virtue of my spirit.
n hour passed, every minute of which was a year of love. The silence of the
night, moonlight, flowers, and trees made us forget all reality except love, when
suddenly we heard the galloping of horses and rattling of carriage wheels.
Awakened from our pleasant swoon and plunged from the world of dreams into
the world of perplexity and misery, we found that the old man had returned from
his mission. We rose and walked through the orchard to meet him.
hen the carriage reached the entrance of the garden, Farris Effandi
dismounted and slowly walked towards us, bending forward slightly as if he were
carrying a heavy load. He approached Selma and placed both of his hands on her
shoulders and stared at her. Tears coursed down his wrinkled cheeks and his lips
trembled with sorrowful smile. In a choking voice, he siad, "My beloved Selma,
very soon you will be taken away from the arms of your father to the arms of
another man. Very soon fate will carry you from this lonely home to the world's
spacious court, and this garden will miss the pressure of your footsteps, and your
father will become a stranger to you. All is done; may God bless you."
earing these words, Selma's face clouded and her eyes froze as if she felt a
premonition of death. Then she screamed, like a bird shot down, suffering, and
trembling, and in a choked voice said, "What do you say? What do you mean?
Where are you sending me?"
hen she looked at him searchingly, trying to discover his secret. In a moment
she said, "I understand. I understand everything. The Bishop has demanded me
from you and has prepared a cage for this bird with broken wings. Is this your
will, Father?"
is answer was a deep sigh. Tenderly he led Selma into the house while I
remained standing in the garden, waves of perplexity beating upon me like a
tempest upon autumn leaves. Then I followed them into the living room, and to
avoid embarrassment, shook the old man's hand, looked at Selma, my beautiful
star, and left the house.
s I reached the end of the garden I heard the old man calling me and turned to
meet him. Apologetically he took my hand and said, "Forgive me, my son. I have
ruined your evening with the sheding of tears, but please come to see me when my
house is deserted and I am lonely and desperate. Youth, my dear son, does not
combine with senility, as morning does not have meet the night; but you will come
to me and call to my memory the youthful days which I spent with your father,
and you will tell me the news of life which does not count me as among its sons
any longer. Will you not visit me when Selma leaves and I am left here in
loneliness?"
hile he said these sorrowful words and I silently shook his hand, I felt the
warm tears falling from his eyes upon my hand. Trembling with sorrow and filial
affection. I felt as if my heart were choked with grief. When I raised my head and
he saw the tears in my eyes, he bent toward me and touched my forehead with his
lips. "Good-bye, son, Good-bye."
n old man's tear is more potent than that of a young man because it is the
residuum of life in his weakening body. A young man's tear is like a drop of dew
on the leaf of a rose, while that of an old man is like a yellow leaf which falls with
the wind at the approach of winter.
s I left the house of Farris Effandi Karamy, Selma's voice still rang in my ears,
her beauty followed me like a wraith, and her father's tears dried slowly on my
hand.
y departure was like Adam's exodus from Paradise, but the Eve of my heart
was not with me to make the whole world an Eden. That night, in which I had been
born again, I felt that I saw death's face for the first time.
hus the sun enlivens and kills the fields with its heat.

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