A selection of exquisite writings on love, marriage and the spiritual union of souls. For Kahlil Gibran (1883 -- 1931), love was a way -- perhaps the supreme way -- of achieving self-realization and completeness as a human being. Anyone can have their life transformed by the all-consuming power of an encounter with the Beloved. Yet everywhere we see people trapped in joyless or arranged marriages, and passion sacrificed to convention. Such themes dominate the section on love in Gibran's most celebrated book, The Prophet, but they are expressed with equal eloquence in his earlier Arabic stories, parables and prose poems. It is because of works like these that the young author became known as 'the Shelley of the East'. This important new translation of one of Gibran's major Arabic texts adds a fresh dimension to our understanding of his whole philosophy and career. Translated by John Walbridge Introduction by Robin Waterfield