Poetic Life.. Review on Gibran : Love Letters - Kahlil Gibran

All things in this creation exist within you, and all things in you exist in creation; there is no border between you and the closest things, and there is no distance between you and the farthest things, and all things, from the lowest to the loftiest, from the smallest to the greatest, are within you as equal things. In one atom are found all the elements of the earth; in one motion of the mind are found the motions of all the laws of existence; in one drop of water are found the secrets of all the endless oceans; in one aspect of you are found all the aspects of existence.

- Kahlil Gibran

Strictly speaking, this review does not deal with the Book ''Love Letter'' alone. But here I would, like to throw some light on the life and works of the astople of eminency KHALIL GIBRAN

Born in Lebanon, but a resident of the United States of America for most of his adult life, Kahlil Gibran holds a unique place among modern writers, inasmuch as he wrote well in both English and Arabic and was widely acclaimed in both cultures. Sitting astride two worlds, Gibran created his own unique literary style, one that has won fans in every generation since.

Born in the small Lebanese village of Bisharri in 1883, the son of an alcoholic tax collector, Gibran was brought with his two sisters to America by his mother in 1895 at the age of 12. Although poor and living in a Boston ghetto, his talent for drawing attracted the attention of some of the city's intellectuals, who introduced him to a circle of established artists and writers, including the painter Lilla Cabot and the poet Louise Guiney.

At age 15, longing to better understand his heritage, Gibran returned to Lebanon, where he enrolled at the Maronite college of Madrasat-al-Hikmah, then perhaps the foremost Christian secondary school in the Arab world. ''This land of mystic beauty became his solace, his source of imagination, and in later years his object of yearning. After four years, he returned to Boston, to face there in short succession the deaths of one of his sisters, his half-brother and his beloved mother, all of who succumbed to poverty-induced illnesses.

Overcoming the impact of these tragedies, Gibran reentered the intellectual and artistic circles of Boston, and he soon found a patron in Mary Elizabeth Haskell, the headmistress of a girls' school who became a financial, intellectual and emotional support to Gibran for much of his life.

Until his untimely death in 1931, at the age of 48, from ''cirrhosis of the liver and incipient tuberculosis,'' the rest of Gibran's life was something of a Bohemian whirl. He spent time in Paris and again visited Lebanon but ultimately settled in New York. He never married but, it is clear, had a series of intense love affairs - one of which was carried on wholly by mail. He often existed almost wholly on ''strong coffee and cigarettes,'' working long into the night on his writing or artwork. He suffered almost continually from poor health and yet soared upon the spiritual visions of his own inner Muse.

Along the way, Gibran met some of the greatest men and women of his time. Among the writers that touched him greatly were Freidrich Nietzsche and William Blake. Such meetings - whether in person or on paper - refined Gibran's own thinking and direction. When combined with his life experiences, these influences helped shape the singular voice that marked his work, which comprises hundreds of essays, poems, drawings and paintings.