The Song of the Soul(Excerpt) by Edwin Leibfreed

Music:
Schindler's List Theme Song-John Williams

The Song of the Soul(Excerpt)
Edwin Leibfreed

Oh to be naked!
My body? Yes, if need be.
My Soul, more than all else.
To be as I am. As small or as large as my Soul.
To speak truth, and scorn man's wrath.
To laugh at convention.
To rejoice at freedom.

To be hated, as well as loved, for Truth's sake.
To care no more for reputation
Than reputation cares for me.
For he who worries about reputation,
Has a reputation to worry about.

To dip into mysteries,
Artlessly, candidly.
To regard life as the Soul's sacred trust.
To know that every longing of the Soul is holy.
That life, with the Soul predominant,
Is a noble mosaic, a bewitching arabesque.

To answer my mother's call to my Soul
My sweet mother, Earth, who loves me!
To satisfy any desire I feel,
So long as I bring happiness to some other.
Not wanton waste of life, but holy use.

To live as would a child, in its cradle, unashamed.
For they who feel shame have not grown wise;
They have lost the purity of innocence!
To do whatsoever my Soul suggests,
And do it openly.
To know that Thought is greater than words.
That words are but the shining garments of Thought.

To know that Thought creates.
That it is greater than the thing it creates;
That it creates Love;
That it is higher than Love;
That it is holier than Love;
That Love is Thought's first-born.
Oh for the courage of Truth!
For the courage of honesty!
What beauteous nakedness in these!

Only man can blush.
No other creature knows of shame.
Why have we wandered so far away
From simple honesty?
Who taught us so much that is shameful?
Or, is it only our vain imaginings?

Now let me speak my mind to you.
One assertion of yourself, and you are born.
One fearless sentence, and you are strong.
One battle with your darling vice,
And you become a champion.
A knowledge of one fragment of Truth,
And you have entered heaven's kingdom.

One glance of purity at a human form,
And you are saved.
One cry to God, and the answer of the universe.
One feast of true love, and hunger no more.
He who strives for happiness is a fool.
The wise man makes happiness for another.

Let the drawn curtains of the House of the Soul
Be parted. Others need the sight.
How sensitive is the Soul! The tenderest dove
Is an adventurer compared with it.
The Soul can hear the violets grow!
It can hear the throbbing heart of God!
Who would scotch my Soul?
Who would make me afraid of myself?

Is a man ashamed when he bathes?
Of what should he be ashamed?
Not of what he bathes,
But of what he does not bathe.
Tears are the Soul's baptism of cleansing.
Describe a smile, and you deserve immortality;
The pleasure of a kiss,
And you deserve them all;
The value of a tear,
And you have knowledge like unto God's!

Love is the sweetest, yet the saddest thing.
The portal of the heart is emotion.
Motion and emotion are kin.
I sob over colors as some men over music.
Music is the highest expression of any art.
All art resolves itself at last into music.
All life seeks harmony.

Love is the Soul's exquisite vibrations,
Slow or rapid, sad or gay.
Love is the Soul at song.
All sense must have feeling, focus, form.
The highest form is harmony.
The fine art of Life is to make
Another Soul vibrate with a song of joy.

Oh to sing my song that is bursting my heart!
To sing it, and let others sing it, too,
Until such time as their own songs
Shall break the chrysalis that binds them,
And, on the lightest-feathered wings,
Go unto God who sings a deathless song.
Who would not journey thus?
And with my song liberated,
Go sauntering on to willing ears,
Enter in, and be at home,
Because of kindred life.
A vesper bell shall toll for the Soul.

Oh, take me, you who love sincerity and truth!
Take me, and embrace me. Kiss me!
I am but a traveler from the sky.
Home! Home! I journey to the only home I know.
The only heaven that I care to know.
There all is love. There all receive all.
Suspicion cannot flourish there,
Nor hate breathe one single gasp of life.

Come, naked Soul, be never dressed again.
Go in unto God, more naked still,
And fear no evil, for He knoweth none.
Into His presence come, and talk of Life--
Your life of broken song.
What notes of joy He will supply!
He will not rob me of my Soul.
My Song, my Hope, nor destroy aught.
He will share His matchless Home with me.

And why not?
Did he not grant me here a Palace
In which to dwell, and shall I doubt
The value of a Soul to Him
Who found it worthy of a first solicitude,
And then a constant care?
Would He deny me now, when face to face?

Alone with God! How shall I further speak?
I seem to feel the hush of Time,
The end of mortal things.
A thrill, unknown before, possesses me.
How near to God I seem!
Some larger purpose holds my view.
I thought to stay here,
Resigned, contented, all alive.
Oh bliss of fuller life!
Oh the sublime gestures of the Soul!
My nakedness to me is very sweet!

Return me if thou wilt, O God,
To earth, or commend me to
Some other sphere if destiny speak so.
I feel the thrill of an eternal plan.
Lo, nothing is lost, not even Time that ceased!
It was the marker, Truth required for this day.
How sweet to be with Truth!
And, yet, still sweeter is it to be Truth, itself!