THE EARTH GODS" 
by Gibran Khalil Gibran


THIRD GOD 


Brothers, my august brothers, 
Down in the myrtle grove 
A girl is dancing to the moon, 
A thousand dew-stars are in her hair, 
About her feet a thousand wings. 


SECOND GOD 


We have planted man, our vine, and tilled the soil 
In the purple mist of the first dawn. 
We watched the lean branches grow, 
And through the days of seasonless years 
We nursed the infant leaves. 
From the angry element we shielded the bud, 
And against all dark spirits we guarded the flower. 
And now that our vine hath yielded the grape 
You will not take it to the winepress and fill the cup. 
Whose mightier hand than yours shall reap the fruit? 
And what nobler end than your thirst awaits the wine? 
Man is food for the gods, 
And the glory of man begins 
When his aimless breath is sucked by gods' hallowed lips. 
All that is human counts for naught if human it remain; 
The innocence of childhood, and the sweet ecstasy of youth, 
The passion of stern manhood, and the wisdom of old age; 
The splendour of kings and the triumph of warriors, 
The fame of poets and the honor of dreamers and saints; 
All these and all that lieth therein is bred for gods. 
And naught but bread ungraced shall it be 
If the gods raise it not to their mouths. 
And as the mute grain turns to love songs when swallowed by the nightingale, 
Even so as bread fo gods shall man taste godhead. 


FIRST GOD 


Aye, man is meat for gods! 
And all that is man shall come upon the gods' eternal board! 
The pain of child-bearing and the agony of childbirth, 
The blind cry of the infant that pierces the naked night, 
And the anguish of the mother wrestling with the sleep she craves, 
To pour life exhausted from her breast; 
The flaming breath of youth tormented, 
And the burdened sobs of passion unspent; 
The dripping brows of manhood tilling the barren land, 
And the regret of pale old age when life against life's will 
Calls to the grave. 
Behold this is man! 
A creature bred on hunger and made food for hungry gods. 
A vine that creeps in dust beneath the feet of deathless death. 
The flower that blooms in nights of evil shadows; 
The grape of mournful days, and days of terror and shame. 
And yet you would have me eat and drink. 
You would bid me sit amongst shrouded faces 
And draw my life from stony lips 
And from withered hands receive my eternity. 


THIRD GOD 


Brothers, my dreaded brothers, 
Thrice deep the youth is singing, 
And thrice higher is his song. 
His voice shakes the forest 
And pierces the sky, 
And scatters the slumbering of earth. 


SECOND GOD (Always unhearing) 

The bee hums harshly in your ears, 
And foul is the honey to your lips. 
Fain would I comfort you, 
But how shall I? 
Only the abyss listens when gods call unto gods, 
For measureless is the gulf that lies between divinities, 
And windless is the space. 
Yet I would comfort you, 
I would make serene your clouded sphere; 
And though equal we are in power and judgement, 
I would counsel you. 

When out of chaos came the earth, and we, sons of the beginning, beheld each other in the
lustless light, we breathed the first hushed, tremulous sound that quickened the currents of air
and sea. 

Then we walked, hand in hand, upon the gray infant world, and out of the echos of our first
drowsy steps time was born, a fourth divinity, that sets his feet upon our footprints, shadowing
our thoughts and desires, and seeing only with our eyes. 

And unto earth came life, and unto life came the spirit, the winged melody of the universe.
And we ruled life and spirit, and none save us knew the measure of the years nor the weight
of years' nebulous dreams, till we, at noontide of the seventh aeon, gave the sea in marriage
to the sun. 

And from the inner chamber of their nuptial ecstasy, we brought man, a creature who, though
yielding and infirm, bears ever the marks of his parentage. 

Through man who walks earth with eyes upon the stars, we find pathways to earth's distant
regions; and of man, the humble reed growing beside dark waters, we make a flute through
whose hollowed heart we pour our voice to the silence-bound world. From the sunless north to
the sun-smitten sand of the south. 

From the lotus land where days are born 
To perilous isles where days are slain, 
Man the faint hearted, overbold by our purpose, 
Ventures with lyre and sword. 
Ours is the will he heralds, 
And ours the sovereignty he proclaims, 
And his love trodden courses are rivers, to the sea of our desires. 
We, upon the heights, in man's sleep dream our dreams. 
We urge his days to part from the valley of twilights 
And seek their fullness upon the hills. 
Our hands direct the tempests that sweep the world 
And summon man from sterile peace to fertile strife, 
And on to triumph. 
In our eyes is the vision that turns man's soul to flame, 
And leads him to exalted loneliness and rebellious prophecy, 
And on to crucifixion. 
Man is born to bondage, 
And in bondage is his honor and his reward. 
In man we seek a mouthpiece, 
And in his life our self fulfillment. 
Whose heart shall echo our voice if the human heart is deafened with dust? 
Who shall behold our shining if man's eye is blinded with night? 
And what would you do with man, child of our earliest heart, our own self image?