IKAN PAUS DAN KUPU-KUPU
Karya: Kahlil Gibran

Suatu sore seorang lelaki dan wanita duduk bersama di atas sebuah panggung. Mereka sudah pernah bertemu sebelumnya. Laki-laki itu seorang penyair, dan ia duduk di samping wanita itu sambil berusaha menyenangkan dengan menyampaikan kisah-kisah menarik, beberapa di antaranya merupakan karangannya sendiri dan beberapa karangan orang lain.

Namun ketika ia sedang bercerita, si wanita tertidur. Tiba-tiba muncul orang lain yang membuat wanita itu terbangun. Agak gugup wanita itu berkata, “Aku mengagumi inteprestasimu tentang cerita Yunus dan ikan paus.”

Sang penyair berkata, “Tapi, Nona, aku tadi menceritakan sebuah kisah karanganku sendiri tentang kupu-kupu dan setangkai mawar putih, dan bagaimana tingkah mereka masing-masing.”

Kahlil Gibran
Buku: Sang Pengelana (1932) – Kahlil Gibran

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THE WHALE AND THE BUTTERFLY
By: Kahlil Gibran

Once on an evening a man and a woman found themselves together in a stagecoach. They had met before.

The man was a poet, and as he sat beside the woman he sought to amuse her with stories, some that were of his own weaving, and some that were not his own.

But even while he was speaking the lady went to sleep. Then suddenly the coach lurched, and she awoke, and she said, “I admire your interpretation of the story of Jonah and the whale.”

And the poet said, “But Madame, I have been telling you a story of mine own about a butterfly and a white rose, and how they behaved the one to the other!”

Khalil Gibran
Book: The Wanderer – His Parables and His Sayings (1932) – Kahlil Gibran