Read here…

A ‘The Prophet‘ extract as writ by Kahlil Gibran

Read here…

A ‘The Prophet‘ extract as writ by Kahlil Gibran

It is said that you are the sum of your experiences, if this be true, then we as a people are in need of some serious introspection, reflection, tears and greater understanding who we are as a people.Only armed with the above revelations will we be able to burn together, and be that flame that no one can put out.

I have to be in agreement with some of the sentiments of the above entry…but in the same breath, there must be a greater understanding, as to why we have become this fractured people, that we are, and more importantly… how we can recover from this state and reach our full potential.

>> Coloured Klong <<

Note to all Beyond Identity kin, the above is a response to Coloured Commandments/Coloured Gedagtes published and directly taken from the Kak Duidelik website with permission I hope.

At Last

At last, my love has come along
My lonely days are over
And life is like a song
Oh, yeah, at last
The skies above are blue
My heart was wrapped up in clovers
The night I looked at you
I found a dream that I could speak to
A dream that I can call my own
I found a thrill to rest my cheek to
A thrill that I have never known
Oh, yeah when you smile, you smile
Oh, and then the spell was cast
And here we are in heaven
For you are mine
At last

- Taken from Mystic Wayfarer
A Coloured Gedagte by Ross Rayners

Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain and his aloneness without regret? Too many fragments of the spirit have I scatterd in these streets, and too many are the children of my longing that walk naked among these hills, and I cannot withdraw from them without a bruden and an ache. It is not a garment I cast off this day, but a skin that I tear with my own hands. Nor is it a thought I leave behind me, but a heart made sweet with hunger and with thirst. Yet I cannot tarry longer. The sea that calls all things unto her calls me, and I must embark. For to stay, though the hours burn in the night, is to freeze and crystallize and be bound in a mould. Fain would I take with me all that is here. But how shall I? A voice cannot carry the tongue and the lips that give it wings. Alone must it seek the ether. And alone and without his nest shall the eagle fly across the sun. Now when he reached the foot of the hill, he turned again towards the sea, and he saw his ship approaching the harbour, and upon her prow the mariners, the men of his own land.

And his soul cried out to them, and he said:

Sons of my ancient mother, you riders of the tides, How often have you sailed in my dreams. And now you come in my awakening, which is my deeper dream. Ready am I to go, and my eagerness with sails full set awaits the wind.  Only another breath will I breathe in this still air, only another loving look cast backward, Then I shall stand among you, a seafarer among seafarers. And you, vast sea, sleepless mother, Who alone are peace and freedom to the river and the stream,  Only another winding will this stream make, only another murmur in this glade, And then shall I come to you, a boundless drop to a boundless ocean. And as he walked he saw from afar men and women leaving their fields and their vineyards and hastening towards the city gates.  And he heard their voices calling his name, and shouting from the field to field telling one another of the coming of the ship.

And he said to himself:

Shall the day of parting be the day of gathering? And shall it be said that my eve was in truth my dawn? And what shall I give unto him who has left his plough in midfurrow, or to him who has stopped the wheel of his winepress? Shall my heart become a tree heavy-laden with fruit that I may gather and give unto them? And shall my desires flow like a fountain that I may fill their cups? Am I a harp that the hand of the mighty may touch me, or a flute that his breath may pass through me? A seeker of silences am I, and what treasure have I found in silences that I may dispense with confidence?  If this is my day of harvest, in what fields have I sowed the seed, and in what unrembered seasons?  If this indeed be the our in which I lift up my lantern, it is not my flame that shall burn therein.

Empty and dark shall I raise my lantern, And the guardian of the night shall fill it with oil and he shall light it also. These things he said in words. But much in his heart remained unsaid. For he himself could not speak his deeper secret. And when he entered into the city all the people came to meet him, and they were crying out to him as with one voice.

And the elders of the city stood forth and said:

Go not yet away from us. A noontide have you been in our twilight, and your youth has given us dreams to dream. No stranger are you among us, nor a guest, but our son and our dearly beloved. Suffer not yet our eyes to hunger for your face.

And the priests and the priestesses said unto him:

Let not the waves of the sea separate us now, and the years you have spent in our midst become a memory. You have walked among us a spirit, and your shadow has been a light upon our faces.  Much have we loved you. But speechless was our love, and with veils has it been veiled. Yet now it cries aloud unto you, and would stand revealed before you. And ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation. And others came also and entreated him. But he answered them not. He only bent his head; and those who stood near saw his tears falling upon his breast. And he and the people proceeded towards the great square before the temple. And there came out of the sanctuary a woman whose name was Almitra. And she was a seeress.  And he looked upon her with exceeding tenderness, for it was she who had first sought and believed in him when he had been but a day in their city.

And she hailed him, saying:

Prophet of God, in quest for the uttermost, long have you searched the distances for your ship. And now your ship has come, and you must needs go. Deep is your longing for the land of your memories and the dwelling place of your greater desires; and our love would not bind you nor our needs hold you. Yet this we ask ere you leave us, that you speak to us and give us of your truth. And we will give it unto our children, and they unto their children, and it shall not perish. In your aloneness you have watched with our days, and in your wakefulness you have listened to the weeping and the laughter of our sleep. Now therefore disclose us to ourselves, and tell us all that has been shown you of that which is between birth and death.

And he answered,

People of Orphalese, of what can I speak save of that which is even now moving your souls?

Read here…

A ‘The Prophet‘ extract as writ by Kahlil Gibran

.

Khalil Gibran (born Gibran Khalil Gibran bin Mikhā’īl bin Sa’ad); January 6, 1883 – April 10, 1931⁾, was a Lebanese American artist, poet, and writer. Born in the town of Bsharri in modern-day Lebanon (then part of the Ottoman Mount Lebanon mutasarrifate), as a young man he emigrated with his family to the United States where he studied art and began his literary career. He is chiefly known for his 1923 book The Prophet, a series of philosophical essays written in English prose. An early example of Inspirational fiction, the book sold well despite a cool critical reception, and became extremely popular in the 1960s counterculture.

Gibran was born in the Christian Maronite town of Bsharri (in modern day northern Lebanon) to the daughter of a Maronite priest. His mother Kamila was thirty when he was born; his father, also named Khalil, was her third husband. As a result of his family’s poverty, Gibran received no formal schooling during his youth. However, priests visited him regularly and taught him about the Bible, as well as the Arabic and Syriac languages. Gibran’s father initially worked in an apothecary but, with gambling debts he was unable to pay, he went to work for a local Ottoman-appointed administrator or local warlord.

Around 1891, extensive complaints by angry subjects led to the administrator being removed and his staff being investigated. Gibran’s father was imprisoned for alleged embezzlement, and his family’s property was confiscated by the authorities. With no home, Kamila Gibran decided to follow her brother to the United States. Although Gibran’s father was released in 1894, Kamila remained resolved and left for New York on June 25, 1895, taking Khalil, his younger sisters Mariana and Sultana, and his elder half-brother Peter(/Bhutros/Butrus).

Read more here…..

>> As writ by Wikipedia <<

Valparaiso

Chase the dog star
Over the sea
Home where my true love is waiting for me
Rope the south wind
Canvas the stars
Harness the moonlight
So she can safely go
Round the Cape Horn to Valparaiso

Red the port light
Starboard the green
How will she know of the devils I’ve seen
Cross in the sky, star of the sea
Under the moonlight, there she can safely go
Round the Cape Horn to Valparaiso
Valparaiso

And every road I walked would take me down to the sea
With every broken promise in my sack
And every love would always send the ship of my heart
Over the rolling sea

If I should die
And water’s my grave
She’ll never know if I’m damned or I’m saved
See the ghost fly over the sea
Under the moonlight, there she can safely go
Round the Cape Horn to Valparaiso
Valparaiso
Valparaiso
Valparaiso

>> Sting <<

In his regular online column on Friday, SA Today, Leon noted that the South African Institute of Race Relations had reported that about a fifth of white South Africans had left the country in the last 10 years and noted that “given a globalising world in which skilled individuals as well as capital investment are more mobile than ever before, and are maximizing their careers by moving elsewhere, government needs to take a hard look at its race-fuelled myopia, and create the conditions that encourage productive South Africans to stay and contribute to growth — which in the longer term is the only real answer to joblessness and poverty”.

The DA leader argued that “rather than discouraging these citizens from staying, moreover, the state should be actively and energetically soliciting the world’s very best practitioners in tackling the enormous problems that currently beset us in so many areas”.

All must be included and valued. He said: “In short: government needs to reassess its message so that all feel included and valued. Foot-dragging at best and vindictiveness at worst undermines all of our futures – most especially those South Africans for too long disadvantaged by our apartheid legacy and whose interests the ruling party professedly wants to advance.

Read the full article here…

>> Donwald Pressly <<