Contemplations Following a Visit to the Kahlil Gibran Memorial Garden
A beautiful spot that I haven’t visited nearly enough in Washington, D.C. is the Kahlil Gibran Memorial Garden, at 3100 Massachusetts Avenue, across from the British Embassy. Today I took a long stroll and stopped by there to rest and engage in quiet contemplation, as the rush hour traffic zoomed past.
Below are a few ruminations based on the several inscriptions inspired by his writing that are found there. I will start with this one that greets the visitor as they approach from the street:
I love you my brother, whoever you are. Whether you worship in your church, kneel in your temple, or pray in your mosque.
You and I are children of one faith, fingers of the loving hand of one supreme being, hand extended to all.
Would that there were more tolerance in the world, something that there seems to be less of which each passing day. Shall we all make a compact, to do better, each and every day, by passing judgement less, reaching across what might seem like an unbridgeable divide more, and recognizing that we all rely on each other to make Planet Earth a livable place?
Next, let’s consider these words:
Do not the spirits who dwell in the ether envy man his pain?
The human emotions that to such a great extent shape our perception of reality can seem overwhelming at times. And indeed they can be, if we try to process them alone. And yet, they also make us who we are, and if and when we share our feelings with others, while we might feel vulnerable in doing so, there is no greater act of humanity.
Let’s take these next three, one by one:
We live only to discover beauty — all else is a form of waiting
It has been said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What is thought to be beautiful has in many cases done harm to entire groups of people, informed as it often has been by differing perceptions of what constitutes beauty. Beauty is most certainly all around us, often in the last place we might think to look.
We extract your elements to make cannons and bombs — but out of our elements you create lilies and roses. How patient you are Earth and how how merciful!
What a truly marvelous gift this planet that we live on is. There is a sustainable path where we live largely in harmony with our natural surroundings, and there is a path that takes us in a very different direction. Which one we choose has major ramifications for us, and even greater for our children and our children’s children.
When you love you should not say God is in my heart, but rather I am in the heart of God
Love is a complicated and powerful emotion, and it might seem like it is emanating from us. That is part of the all-too-human tendency to put ourselves in the center of every situation. Embracing the forces that pull us together, rather than apart, is not only a very human thing to do, it recognizes that we are just one small piece of a very large puzzle.
And to conclude with these two:
Life without freedom is like a body without a soul, and freedom without thought is confusion
Freedom, once lost, is difficult to regain. And yet, seeking out freedom for its own sake, as an end in itself, corrupts it. Let us remember that what may seem like freedom to us may in fact constrict the choices available to others.
That which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment that scattered the stars into space
It is truly a marvel to be alive, and the existence of the cosmos boggles the mind. There is a primal force that exists, and some of us may choose to live in harmony with it, while others resist it. We owe it to each other to be the best possible version of ourselves.
