beyond my solitude

Beyond my solitude is another solitude, 
and to him who dwells therein, 
my aloneness is a crowded market-place and my silence a confusion of sounds.

Too young am I and too restless to seek that above-solitude.  
The voices of yonder valley still hold my ears, 
and its shadows bar my way and I cannot go.

Beyond these hills is a grove of enchantment and to him who dwells therein, 
my peace is but a whirlwind and my enchantment an illusion.

To young am I and too riotous to seek that sacred grove.  
The taste of blood is clinging in my mouth, 
and the bow and the arrows of my fathers yet linger in my hand and I cannot go.

Beyond this burdened self lives my freer self; and to him, 
my dreams are a battle fought in twilight and my desires, the rattling of bones.

Too young am I and too outraged to be my freer self.

And how shall I become my freer self unless I slay my burdened selves, 
or unless all men become free?

How shall my leaves fly singing upon the wind unless my roots shall wither in the dark?

How shall the eagle in me soar against the sun until my fledglings leave the nest 
which I with my own beak have built for them?

~ Kahlil Gibran

from Poems, Parables and Drawings