Then I returned mentally and said, “It appears that you are in need of help; will you accept a few coins from me?” And with a sad smile he answered me, saying, “Yes, I am in desperate need, but not of gold or silver.”

Puzzled, I asked, “What is it that you require?”

“I am in need of shelter. I am in need of a place where I can rest my head and my thoughts.”

“Please accept these two denars and go to the inn for lodging,” I insisted.

Sorrowfully he answered, “I have tried every inn, and knocked at every door, but in vain. I have entered every food shop, but none cared to help me. I am hurt, not hungry; I am disappointed, not tired; I seek not a roof, but human shelter.”

I said within myself, “What a strange person he is! Once he talks like a philosopher and again like a madman!” As I whispered these thoughts into the ears of my inner self, he stared at me, lowered his voice to a sad level, and said, “Yes, I am a madman, but even a madman will find himself a stranger without shelter and hungry without food, for the heart of man is empty.”

I apologized to him, saying, “I regret my unwitting thought. Would you accept my hospitality and take shelter in my quarters?”

“I knocked at your door and all the doors one thousand times, and received no answer,” he answered severely.

Now I was convinced that he was truly a madman, and I suggested, “Let us go now, and proceed to my home.”

He lifted his head slowly and said, “If you were aware of my identity you would not invite me to your home.”

“Who are you?” I inquired, fearfully, slowly.

With a voice that sounded like the roar of the ocean, he thundered, bitterly, “I am the revolution who builds what the nations destroy.… I am the tempest who uproots the plants, grown by the ages.… I am the one who came to spread war on earth and not peace, for man is content only in misery!”

And, with tears coursing down his cheeks, he stood up high, and a mist of light grew about him, and he stretched forth his arms, and I saw the marks of the nails in the palms of his hands; I prostrated myself before him convulsively and cried out, saying, “Oh Jesus, the Nazarene!”

And He continued, in anguish, “The people are celebrating in My honour, pursuing the tradition woven by the ages around My name, but as to Myself, I am a stranger wandering from East to West upon this earth, and no one knows of Me. The foxes have their holes, and the birds of the skies their nests, but the Son of Man has no place to rest His head.”

At that moment, I opened my eyes, lifted my head, and looked around, but found naught except a column of smoke before me, and I heard only the shivering voice of the silence of the night, coming from the depths of Eternity. I collected myself and looked again to the singing throngs in the distance, and a voice within me said, “The very strength that protects the heart from injury is the strength that prevents the heart from enlarging to its intended greatness within. The song of the voice is sweet, but the song of the heart is the pure voice of heaven.”

SONG OF THE WAVE

THE STRONG SHORE is my beloved

And I am his sweetheart.

We are at last united by love, and

Then the moon draws me from him.

I go to him in haste and depart

Reluctantly, with many

Little farewells.

I steal swiftly from behind the

Blue horizon to cast the silver of

My foam upon the gold of his sand, and

We blend in melted brilliance.

I quench his thirst and submerge his

Heart; he softens my voice and subdues

My temper.

At dawn I recite the rules of love upon

His ears, and he embraces me longingly.

At eventide I sing to him the song of

Hope, and then print smooth kisses upon

His face; I am swift and fearful, but he

Is quiet, patient, and thoughtful. His

Broad bosom soothes my restlessness.

As the tide comes we caress each other,

When it withdraws, I drop to his feet in

Prayer.

Many times have I danced around mermaids

As they rose from the depths and rested

Upon my crest to watch the stars;

Many times have I heard lovers complain

Of their smallness, and I helped them to sigh.

Many times have I teased the great rocks

And fondled them with a smile, but never

Have I received laughter from them;

Many times have I lifted drowning souls

And carried them tenderly to my beloved

Shore. He gives them strength as he

Takes mine.

Many times have I stolen gems from the

Depths and presented them to my beloved

Shore. He takes in silence, but still

I give for he welcomes me ever.

In the heaviness of night, when all

Creatures seek the ghost of Slumber, I

Sit up, singing at one time and sighing

At another. I am awake always.

Alas! Sleeplessness has weakened me!

But I am a lover, and the truth of love

Is strong.

I may weary, but I shall never die.

IRAM, CITY OF LOFTY
PILLARS

TRANSLATOR’S PROLOGUE

“Seest thou not how thy God

Dealt with Ad of Iram, with

Lofty pillars, the like of

Which were not produced in

All of existence?”

The Holy Quran.

THE AD PEOPLE, with their Prophet Hud, are cited often in the Holy Quran, and their traditions belong to ancient Arabia. Their eponymous ancestor Ad was fourth in generation from Noah, having been a son of Aus, who was the son of Aram, who was the son of Shem, who was the first son of Noah.

They occupied a great tract of southern Arabia, extending from Umman at the mouth of the Persian Gulf to Hadramaut and Yemen at the southern end of the Red Sea, and the long, twisting areas of ahqaf (sands) in their domain were irrigated by canals.

The people were of great physical stature, and were excellent masons and builders. However, as so often happens, their vast advancements resulted in the forsaking of the true God, and the leaders anguished the people with oppression in its most severe state.

A three year famine visited them, but they took no warning, and at length a terrible and tremendous blast of searing wind destroyed them and their civilization. A remnant, known as the Second Ad, or Thamud, salvaged itself and survived, but later suffered a similar fate, presumably because of the sins of the people.

The tomb of the Prophet Hud (Qabr Nabi Hud) is still shown to visitors in Hadramaut, latitude 16 degrees north, longitude 49½ degrees east, about 90 miles north of Mukalla. Ruins and inscriptions abound in the general vicinity, and there is an annual pilgrimage to this site in the month of Rajab*

Iram appears to have been an ancient Ad capital in southern Arabia, and it boasted lofty architecture. Controversially, some archaeologists and historians believe Iram to be the name of an individual hero of the Ad, and if this be true, the descriptive phrase “lofty pillars” applies not to the edifices, but to the people themselves, for the Ad were a tall race.

This sector, sometimes called Arabia Felix, is a source of interest, devotion and prosperity to many Arabs, for in its many ancient remains, numerous objects of historical, religious, and monetary value have been found. In the time of Muawiya a rich cache of precious stones was discovered, and more recently some gold, silver, and bronze pieces of statuary bearing Sabaean inscriptions came to light in Najram. These have been described in detail in the British Museum Quarterly, Volume 4, September 1937.

The source of the foregoing lineage and geography is the Holy Quran. Kahlil Gibran probably based his play “Iram, the City of Lofty Pillars” on this information, or upon similar Eastern mythology pursuing the general vein of the following brief Arabian fantasy:

“When Shaddad, the son of Ad, became the Great King of the World, he commanded one thousand Emirs to seek for him a vast land abundant with water and pure air, that he might build in it a Golden City afar from the mountains. The rulers roamed throughout the world in quest of such land, and each Emir took with him one thousand men.

“And when it was found, the architects and builders erected within it a square city of forty leagues. They built a huge wall extending five hundred cubits, made of onyx stones, and covered it with sheets of gold that misted the eyes when the sun shone.

“And King Shaddad despatched his people to all parts of the world, and commanded them to dig out gold from the ground, to be used as mortar for the bricks. And he built inside the city walls one hundred thousand palaces for one hundred thousand officials of his kingdom. Each palace was erected upon columns of chrysolite and ruby blended with gold, and each column reached one hundred cubits toward heaven.

“And the rivers were brought through the city, and their tributaries through the palaces. The roadways of the city were gold and precious stones and ruby, and the palaces were adorned richly with gold and silver. Trees were imbedded along the banks of the river, and their branches were of living gold, and their leaves of silver, and their fruits of onyx and pearls. And the walls of the palaces were embellished with musk and ambergris.

“And King Shaddad built for himself a garden whose trees were of emerald and ruby, and upon the branches were singing birds of pure gold.”

THE PLAY

IRAM, CITY OF LOFTY PILLARS

The locale of the play: A small forest of walnut, pomegranate and poplar trees. In this forest, between the Orantes River (Nahr el’Asi) and the village of Hermil, stands an old solitary house in a clearing.

The time of the play: Late afternoon in mid-July, 1883.

The characters of the play:

Zain Abedeen of Nahawand, forty years old, who is a Persian Dervish and a mystic.

Najeeb Rahmé, thirty years old, a Lebanese scholar.

Amena Divine, age unknown, prophetic and mysterious, known in the vicinity as the Houri of the Valley.

As the curtain rises, Zain Abedeen is seen leaning his head on one hand, under the trees, and with his long walking staff is inscribing circular figures upon the ground. Najeeb Rahmé enters the clearing on a horse a few moments thereafter. He dismounts, fastens the rein to the trunk of a tree, dusts his clothes and approaches Zain Abedeen.

NAJEEB: Peace be with you, Sir!

ZAIN: And with you be peace. (He turns his face aside and whispers to himself): Peace we shall accept … but superiority? That is a different matter.

NAJEEB: Is this the abiding place of Amena Divine?

ZAIN: This is but one of her several abodes. She lives in none, yet she exists in all.

NAJEEB: I have inquired of many, vet none knew Amena Divine had numerous dwellings.

ZAIN: This establishes that your informants are people who cannot see except with their eyes, nor hear except through their ears.