Fwd: A GENIUS BIDS FAREWELL

[faura2002]

A GENIUS BIDS FAREWELL 

Critically acclaimed author Gabriel Garcia Marquez has retired from 
public life due to health reasons: cancer of the lymph nodes. He has 
sent a farewell letter to his friends, and thanks to the 
Internet it is spreading. 

I recommend that you read it. This short text, written by one of the 
most brilliant Latin Americans in recent times, is truly moving. 

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A GENIUS BIDS FAREWELL 

If for an instant God were to forget that I am a rag doll and gifted 
me 
with a piece of life, possibly I wouldn't say all that 

I think, but rather I would think of all that I say. 

I would value things, not for their worth but for what they mean. 
I would sleep little, dream more, understanding that for each minute 
we close our eyes 
we lose sixty seconds of light. 

I would walk when others hold back, I would wake when others sleep. 
I would listen when others talk, and how I would enjoy a good 
chocolate ice cream! 

If God were to give me a piece of life, I would dress simply, throw 
myself face first in the sun, baring not only my body but also my 
soul. 

My God, if I had a heart, I would write my hate on ice, and wait for 
the sun to show. 
Over the stars I would paint with a Van Gogh, dream a Benedetti poem, 
and a Serrat song would be the serenade I'd offer to the moon. 

With my tears I would water roses, to feel the pain of their thorns, 
and 
the red kiss of their petals! 

My God, if I had a piece of life, I wouldn't let a single day pass 
without 
telling people I love that I love them. 

I would convince each woman and each man that they are my favorites, 
and I would live in love with love. 

I would show men how very wrong they are to think that they cease to 
be in love 
when they grow old, not knowing that they grow old when they cease to 
be in love! 

To a child I shall give wings, but I shall let him 
learn to fly on his  own. 

I would teach the old that death does not come with old age, 
but with forgetting. So much have I learned from you, oh men! 

I have learned that everyone wants to live on the peak of the 
mountain, 
without knowing that real happiness is in how it is scaled. 

I have learned that when a newborn child squeezes for the first time 
with 
his tiny fist his father's finger, he has him trapped forever. 

I have learned that a man has the right to look down on another only 
when he has to help the other get to his feet. 

>From you I have learned so many things, but in truth they won't be of 
much 
use, for when I keep them within this suitcase, unhappily shall I be 
dying. 

- Gabriel Garcia Marquez