Fighting the hole

As I spread my hands before me, with Your many names upon my lips fervently hung over Your attributes of Forgiveness, Giving, Listening, Answering, Knowing, Seeing, Hearing, All Ableness, and so much more... I fixate on the spot that looks like a hole. I see around that hole blessings abound; so many that I cannot count them one by one in thanks... but, I thank You for each and every one of them as only You would Know Best and hopefully Accept. But, the eyes... these woefully-possessed-as-if-uncontrollable-eyes keep getting drawn back to that one speck, which is not a mole, and keep looking at it as a black hole. It seems to have a fluctuating depth of hollow never-endingness or perhaps just a slight bend on the road of many gifts, depends on which state of peace the heart is in. As the soul fervently focuses on thanks and gratitude and humility, the eyes are perturbed by whispers of the devil... the nafs... the humanness? Which, I'll never know. But as the focus comes upon it, in all it's ebbs and flows, all it keeps looking at is that one blessing I could not get to hold on to. It came into my life plenty of times, but only to tempt me, make me weak, ungrateful, and so frustrated... because I could not hold on to it. It keeps piercing into the abyss trying to pull itself out of it, and in the struggle of the jump and the pull, it tires itself of the screams that are it's own recriminations. It slumps into the wet mess of it's own tears and continues thanking The All Knowing Able One Who has Made me who I am, to live the tests that have been written down for me, and hope not to fail, and hope to keep surfacing back up with thanks... For if the gratitude were to be lost, so would all hope of sanity and a blessed Eternity. Ya Ar Rahman Ar Raheem, Ya Ghafoor Ar Kareem - please Hold me as I feel like I am drowning... If You Save me not, I will drown myself in my tears. Please Hush my hankerings and Take me away from my human needs and wants that will suffocate me without Your Intervention. My salvation lies only in Your Holding me and Sufficing me. I plead You to Hold me and Suffice me. Ameen, Ya Dhall Jalaali Wal Ikram.




*Written to Sange Saboor playing out in the background. My Lord being my only Pillar of Patience whereupon I stop to cry.

Tether Ye Were Not It Seems

The real test begins when you pine in silence, in between prayer, your own audience, and your tears. When you console yourself that The One Who Listens to all, can hear you. When you pray ever more fervently that He will Help you through this because He has a Plan better for you than you can understand. As you traverse the lanes of memories that will be evoked at random, of words shared, of likes and dislikes, of shared emotions and opinions and wishes, every stroke of that uninvited memory will grate at your patience and hankerings. You will break, shatter, crumble, moan, and hold yourself. You will try to breathe in and breathe out as calmly as the moment will allow it, and not let yourself remain on the ground. You will pick yourself back up again. You know how to do this. Life has been a constant practice of doing just this. There are so many compartments that have been designated to demons conquered. You know you can do this. Yes, there will be times of weakness, when questions will haunt you and make you wonder what it was that you could have done otherwise. Yes, there will be times of sadness when you will imagine how beautiful things could have been if only you were not hoping on things alone, but you are. Hoping on things alone. And alone, you can only do so much. So it is best to keep letting go of what has left you. Chasing it is every kind of painful and will leave you ever more so profoundly alone. Hug your soft covers, your pillows, your cushions and be thankful for having these blessings. The blessings that many others don't. So what if they aren't as warm as an actual body. So what if they don't hold you back. At least they offer some comfort as opposed to none. The privacy of your room allows you to relive things in peace. It allows you to cry and pray and beg your Maker in ways where you are free to turn your insides out and pour your grief out to Him unabashedly. Be grateful that your Maker permits you to use His words, His praises, His names, and reach out to Him. In grief many have lost their way. Be grateful you know how to respond to your grief. You are alone, but never so without Him being with you always. He may not be the body that your body was made to crave. But He is your Maker and He will bring you out of this new pain. He will help you fashion a new compartment for this fresh loss and He will Help you get through the prickly path where the roses of words shared will tempt and entice you with their scents, as well as prick you with the thorns of their impermanence, their transient visit into your life; Brief, oh so unreal, surreal, call it whatever you may, but that's what it was. The roses were never meant for eternity. Let the memory of that scent fade away, because if it were meant to stay, it would have found a home within the confines of your precious book, to leave a permanent ink of it's form, or a debris of it's existence, albeit more delicate in it's dried out form, but a presence nonetheless. It's existence would have been proof of it's commitment, and you have nothing but static that typed itself out via a format of numbers and words. It was a binary, a code... human? No one knows because experience tells you many humans come in the most mechanical forms just to short circuit your entire being, with intentions of passing time where you are the toy that gathered their attention for now. You are not a tether for no camel. Only Allah Knows what you are because at most times usually, you are quite a susceptible fool. Your one worthy trait is that at least you can pray. Always be grateful for that. Pray to Him to make you more resilient and more alert to the dangers of those who wish to rouse your heart and feelings with no intentions to stick around and honour you. Honouring things takes more heart and strength of character than what most of this world is capable of offering. So be careful and save yourself before another fall. Your injuries sustained thus far may be plentiful, but you have so much to be grateful for. Just never let go of that. Sabr and Shukr will get you through this life always. Never let go of them. Wash yourself of the pain you feel right now and stand back up in prayer. When your head bows down; weep, and when you rise back up; breathe, and when you are done; savour that moment of inexplicable peace. May He The Most Loving, always be enough for you. Ameen.

When Everything Aches

Every part of me feels broken, inside out. Heal all of us who are broken, Ya Allah. Only You Know how. Protect us from all that is evil around us. Only You Know what we need saving from. Ameen Ya Rabb Al Ameen.

Fighting Despair

When I look to the world it brutally crushes my hopes and tells me all about how 'this' isn't possible and 'that' will never happen. Then I remind myself of The Maker of all things and I shout out, ''Ya Lateef! Ya Jabbar! Ya Fattah, iftah alayy! Oh the Most Subtle One, The Compeller, The Opener of all doors and gates, and everything else, please Open up my way! I ask not of the world whose people tell me of all things impossible! I ask You, O Creator of all things, You for Whom nothing is impossible! Please send me that which my heart is too afraid to put into words to ask of You, forever seeking right words and never being able to form them; Please send to me from Your infinite bounties a beautiful patience, contentment, peace, happiness and gratefulness in all forms and things of this life; Please send upon me Your infinite Mercy and Khair; I am your heedless forgetful wanting creation begging You to never Forsake me, and to Fill me up in the places that feel empty and bereft of Your Blessings; Please Hold me close Ya Wudood, The Most Loving, Oh Alllah! Allahumma Ameen.''

Mediocre

Leela; Where I Paused, Breathed, and Prayed

I sit here tonight, my last night here insha’Allah for the foreseeable future. Tears stream down my face, for it is not just tonight, but every night that I need to be more grateful. It has been ever more heavy on my heart where I feel that I am unable to express my gratitude to my Lord. I have moments of no emotion and thoughts, while I live my now – and my now, when I stop to think about it, is grand and splendid and everything rich. It is my blessing. It is my now. Am I making the most of it? Am I being grateful enough? Have I taken advantage of it as I was meant to? Has it given me peace and contentment? Am I looking deeper into in a now that is not any deeper than I have already reached? Why am I feeling like I am missing something? I ache from a fear that I may be doing something wrong? I deliberately am not. I consciously am trying to do all things right. I pray I am not wasting my grace. I pray I am doing justice with the share that I have been endowed with and blessed with. I am surrounded by splendor and majesty; in spirit and in manifest glory. I am in the middle of it. Every ounce of me, when it just stops and feels, overwhelms itself to tears. Tears seem to have become my expression of happiness, joy, reaction to beauty, sadness, responses to pain, brokenness, and everything else in between. Are tears going to be my salvation as I tread forward onto a shaken path, finding myself again? If nothing else, I pray my eternity will remove all doubt and shower me with a union of unparalleled peace and happiness. I want to be grateful for everything else until then. I pray my fallen grace never fails to get back up and say thanks. I pray my hope never bleeds out. I pray that the overwhelming questions go to sleep and wake up to answers that will stand sturdy, take my hand, and all will be alright. Insha’Allah. Oh Allah, please accept my thanks, for everything. For every moment and thing and person who helps me remember You more. Please bless them. I love You.

Verbal Blows

Is there no softness to your being?
Not a kind word,
Not a kind look,
Nothing?
Be not so absorbed in yourself!
Please?
You are supposed to be precious.
To her, to me, to us.
Why make it so difficult?
We beg for ‘your’ forgiveness
from the One Who Forgives
But not everyone else will.
And this shall remain a constant fear
In our hearts that pray
For you to soften,
Your words to soften,
Your being to soften…
‘Ya Muqallib Al-Quloob
Oh Turner of hearts,
Please make all that is hard in him
soft.’
Ameen.

The Problem...

The problem with most of us as we grow older, is that we truly believe we are the ones who will change a person whom others have failed to change. We believe this deep in our hearts, and firmly resolve to get to it; changing the person/people. This can be seen in a picture where the woman believes ‘she’ will be the one to change the man (who all this while has refused to budge in his ways, many before her have similarly tried, lost, and walked out of the picture). The same goes for children with their parents. What’s even more striking is that when I personally think about this latter situation - I remember going through all the hopes and aspirations of bringing about a change in my house, its people - which my siblings (a decade and more my junior), now aspire to do so too. Perhaps my intentions came later, age wise, than do theirs – but the fact remains that I have tread the path that they are on, but sadly they will refuse to learn through my experiences because they insist on travelling the roads themselves. This is sad because most of us will insist on travelling the road ourselves, no matter the amount of advice that exists out there to help steer us away from expected failure.

I’ve noticed the pattern. I was once that age too. I believed in things being a certain way. I believed in home being a certain way, parents being a certain way, but then… life happened. How?

I tried.

I failed.

I tried again.

I failed again…

And this went on for some time, until some years into this repetitive dysfunctional twist, a mist of sorts began to clear. I realized, after all these trials and errors, that home was where the heart was… I realized that it wasn’t just an adage, but reality. It was simply inexplicable – it had to be tried. I resented the place I wanted to change, I resented the people who refused to change (in their ways, their mindsets) stubbornly unrelenting – and so I imagined a home elsewhere.

Where?

Away from here is all I knew then. But every time I ventured into an ‘away’, I was sorely lost, and wishing to return home. To the very place where the heart would not be at rest.

I guess that is the problem. The heart. It is fickle and easily swerved. It is quite easily tempered by the whims and fancies that the Shaytan and the Shaya’ateen scatter around it. It latches on quite easily, not letting go unless really worked upon from the inside. But for us to be successful in warding it off from the inside, we have to remain firm in our belief that all that is happening is just as it was meant to be, and in it being so, there is good. I must let go of everything else and just try and seek that good; attempt to understand it, and accept it whole heartedly. And despite finding ourselves having found that belief, we remain susceptible to losing it every now and then. We cave in to the misery that wishes to surface, and bemoan our current stand point; forgetting that this very now is where we are supposed to be, meant to be standing in. It is how we find a way out of it, without the resentment, that remains a Herculian task that has not yet been mastered. And so we find ourselves setting off to try and change those around us, in hopes of finding solace and peace with their change. But the solace and peace, in my opinion now, does not come from a change in those around us. I think it comes from changing our own perspective on things, and by being in control of how we respond to the unrelenting forces around us. And through it all, we need to be stronger and firmer in our faith. Insha’Allah, things will fall into place and He shall say Be; and it shall.

~ May He (swt) make this journey easy for us all, may He provide us with the right companion (as He did to Moses (AS)), may He keep us staunch in our faith always, may He forever guide us, show us the Light, keep us under His shade, forgive us our blights, slights, and pick us up to take us through all our falls, rendering us to be ever stronger, ever firmer in our path to Him and His Promises… Ameen!

Cleansing

With a pencil in my hand, on a paper I begin this scrawl... a paper from a book which was until a recent past, singed with memoirs of yester-years; replete with grave mistakes and painful choices. I sit here today, having removed proof of most of my errors. Why I had stored memories away, to begin with, baffled me when I undertook the task of reading things which seemed to have been forgotten with time. Letters which in their time evoked streams of joy, anticipation, fear... seemed to have lost their marvel when I sat reading them, before I ripped them up - piece by piece - and calmly piled them into a trash bag; stuffing bags through their seams by the time every piece was removed. I was left clutching on to scattered bits of memories, as they had been stirred into an awakening unplanned and unpleasant - I coerced myself and hurried to lay them all to rest as I prayed upon my Lord for whom I had forsaken everything and by Whose Grace I had been living since; saved from any more grief that could be perceived by a wanting soul - of then and now. I seem to find myself at a fork in the road, where I hope to lay the dead to rest and finally find a peace permanent. Part of me wishes that I could go back to a better part of me that existed then and merge it with the better part of me that exists today... Alas, this is not to be, for if wishes were horses then beggars would surely ride. With this adage in mind, I hope the best part of me is not entirely lost, but remains somewhere preciously safe... patiently waiting to be properly found a final time around... insha'Allah; Ameen!

Inna mai'ya rabbi sa yahdeen... [Indeed, with me is My Lord... He will guide me through - Al Quran 26:62]

Her Existence

It's a projection.                                                                     
Standing aside, 
Moving along, 
Drifting around, 
Strung out, and... 
Seldom adorned.

It's a shadow.

Of yesterdays gone,

When things were deeply mourned,

Happiness was ostentatiously celebrated,

Where matters were imminently important,

and not all worth feeling for, stood mostly dissipated.

It's a blandness.

Wishful respites,
Existing despite,
Thankful abounds,
For that, and...
All decreed.

Jaded

This post has been inspired by the song, I don't feel it anymore - by William Fitzsimmons...

william fitzsimmons i dont feel it anymore mp3 | lyrics

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I don't feel it anymore. Much of anything mostly offlate. It was all taken away? I lost it on the way? It's not here, where it matters anymore - and that's what matters. I don't feel it anymore; the care, the worry, the need - I don't see it anymore. Anything. Much of everything - it's all just flitting on by. 20 years and then, 10. Come and gone. I was young once. No more; I certainly don't feel it anymore. No reason to make me try, want to just more than get on by. Nothing to spur me on, better myself... For myself it is this way or that - who cares? Not I, I don't see much of anything anymore. I used to feel once, but it's certainly not so now, no more do I, for you've all taken it all away. The little glimmers of possibility that take life in my heart are put off like a candle just lit but drenched by rain. The down pour has become infertile. No more do the tears release the pain. It locks itself in and seems too afraid to breathe even. I've hurt for quite some time now, and I don't think all that time will ever be returned. To hope for a happiness in anything certain, seems not to be happening; it is to be taken away, just like all things else here, in this now and in this today. Leave it all, I wish for, to remove myself from everything and find peace in not feeling anything anymore. I'm fine. I don't need to feel or see any of it - any way.

Every time there remains a longing. I realise, I had fooled myself, but now time is up again - must come back to reality. Reality is the mother of all things hollow, painful, resounding those two traits over and over in order to achieve a complete cycle of pain and it's many myriads. You're still typing the angst out of an empty vessel, that wishes to bemoan a thousand and one things, but is lost with words not enough - perhaps words precise - to narrate itself. This is a longing pining to be filled. This is a pang longing to be fulfilled. This is an anguish hardly unleashed, barely assuaged of what it wishes to achieve. Buries itself in prayer and meditation; Dhikr. Ups and downs, to's and fro's. Redundant rebounds, absolute - paramount; Alas bare and vagabond. I confirm to nothing. Not I, nor my being. I only submit to the Will of the One, and His spin wishes me to swirl some more reels of lessons down pat, before I can breathe my last. With in these spins I have to find my smile, and mean it. With in these spins I have to unwind. The doubtful possible will be made possible - and on that note I shall end this diatribe, a rant even. 

I don't need to feel anything else, anymore - You, they, Hey, go on - take it all away, for I don't feel it anymore. The wait on for eternity will keep me going, nothing else from any of you do I need to feel something, only for it to go again. It did before, and it will - that is the only certainty. So just leave me with my thoughts, jaded as they and I together may seem. I don't need to feel anything, anymore. I will wait for that certainty, I will wait, certainly - I will wait forever more...

         

You, Whom I Used To Know...

What is the meaning of this, ''Here today... Gone tomorrow...''

Why are you set on repeat? Teaching a new story each time,

Lessons replete; some unpalatable, some in retrospect meant to be a treat,

What is the meaning of this, ''A part of me, you - yet later - no more?''

Why are you transient; with your lessons of stubborn impermanence!

Oh, the new you's, the old few's - the heart, perplexedly, doth wonder...

* Dedicated to friendships... The song, 'cos the chorus sat well with the sentiment - the rest, enjoyable nevertheless too :D

As Good As Gone?

The Weepies - Same Changes


Today I am sad over something I never had. I hate you PMS, go away because you don't even let me pray and you always lead me astray. I really don't like you. It's always lonely here with you. I don't want the company of your tears. I want peace back in my heart. These last few weeks have been beautiful and I want that peace back please. Please...

Flustered & Numbed?

Tick-Tock of the memory clock raises the little fine hair at the back of her neck. This anxiety has the power to cripple her and what remains of her senses off late, but she manages to abate it all chanting to the words that she holds on to really tight, lest even they desert her.

No, please God, no! I mustn't let the devil whisper into my ears again! Many a times he has left me stranded, feeling a fool for having fallen for his treachery, but not again please! I beseech Ye, my All and Everything! Please save me from my own musings, for a deep ache has taken hold of everything and just about anything that exists in my now.

Recriminations I want not to linger with, Anger I want not to feel, Frustrations I want not to battle - Oh Dear Magnificent and Most Merciful One - please take me under your Shade and make it all feel better?

~Ameen.

And with a giant heave, she silences herself for as long as this while will exist...

Resilience Through A Reminisce?

Rihanna:
 

The things we do for attention
For a little moment in which to be noticed
All for what?
A test after test after test after test...
This too shall pass
It all has to date
You too shall become a memory
Hopefully to fade faster
Now that time has given us
Ample practice to weather such storms and breezes
Or just a slight draft even
Frail no more shall we be!
Force ourselves to be sturdy
Brush our shoulders we shall
No pain shall we let through
Resilience is the love that shall be ours to stay
Hope is our companion through pebbles such
That are strewn haphazardly along our every way
Let our head hang low we wont - Nay!
Our heart shall not dwell in dismay
What length and width giveth our silly moments and time
To something so trivial!
  A mountain of age old molehill
Boredom perhaps has tilled?
Who knows whether potential it had
Or was simply imagined
Another day, another plan
Time shall surely unravel
And in its wait our patience shall be the guide
Assuring that no disdain or angst
In our life shall stay too long to tar or mar
Our faith in all those whom we wish to remain by our side
In times of reminisce when we sit back tomorrow...

...inshaAllah, Ameen!

The Seemingly Impenetrable Door

The lock on the door was tricky. Seemed like it budged only to reveal that it was actually jammed. Innately faulty or an engineering defect? One would wonder but would fail to arrive at an acceptable mortally conjured verdict. Sometimes this doorway allowed a tiny peak of light from the other side, viewed for long enough to get one to pine for what it could get a glimpse of, but before the eyes and heart could have a fill of it - it was jarred back tight into its mysterious but age accustomed grooves of familiarity ensuring that the latch was back in place rendering all passage through - surely impossible!

All is as it should be? Perhaps only time can tell. But how impossible could a walk through a door be? How solid or impenetrable could a lock be? Why was this step beyond the a-fore crossed, seeming to become more and more of a tedium? On counting, realisation weighed heavy and divulged thus; the number of diligent attempts to walk past the threshold were on a statistically recorded high, but the breaths which enabled them forward, were definitely not just low in power but also noticeably limited.

One day, to see the other side of the door remained a yearning which silently hoped to be fulfilled in its one blessed lifetime...

InshaAllah, Ameen.

Release Yourselves

adele set fire to the rain mp3 | lyrics

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As we live it, you and I
We have not much left to blame
After all the pages turned
over and over
Pictures burned and removed
from their seamless covers
Pointless repeats you have become
The pain that came with you
The pain that left with you
Redundant musings;
Petrified, Molly Coddled, Lain to sleep
Reality sublime forever clear
in its moment leaves you awake
To truth not before seen
Dreams that were only dreams
Stark facts that you sit here ruffling through your brain
Nothing but an empty terrain; bare
Let yourself let them go
May it all sink in and finally rest
never to surface again...

Unlabelled Diagnosis

Uncertainty...

No clarity...
I wonder what people see...

A mystery?
Disparity?
This confusion's testing 

To begin with, questionable sanity.

Uninspired

This was not her call

She was not enthralled

Opaque windows, tinted bygones

On a road yonder

A wanderer in her heart she found

Barricades risen like blooming hail

Wishy -washy thoughts amidst them sail

Amidst the cries that laugh and hurl

Words hollow, blows unfurled

Tinsel town with intricate shadows

Names like tags on pages followed

This was not her call

She was not enthralled

Even on fingers they lasted not;

Numbers few, remained through life's cast

Haunts That Taunt; Salvation Sought!

You've done this before, and You'll help again; again and again, as many times as help shall be needed or sought. With this faith I find myself able to survive. It is the crossroads that I have arrived on again. The before has become alive now, and this now is harder to forget than it was before. Could it be that I had been so successful in dealing with the gravity of it all in the past, that I have forgotten the struggle of it then? Could it be possible that the struggle anew is to remind myself of the good that can come of it, if successfully dealt with again? What fails to make sense is, why that? Why that, which no one else would understand unless they were to have lived it, seen it, or been through something akin to it themselves? Someone who is not aware of the issue can never understand the issue. Between this logic I see a thin road that is hard for all to tread. Barely any are able to find a foothold firm enough to get past a step or two at best. The test for me remains, to keep my silence and maintain respect despite the odds. My love for her lives in my soul, for her to know, for Him to bless, and for me to be able to successfully share with her. This I find hard, but am adamant to achieve it, sooner than later. It is the silently monitored respect for the other half that I find interspersed between a better me and a weak me. The better me had succeeded in forgiving, but the weaker me could not forget. The better me had managed to bury if not forget for most part, but the weaker me has managed to let it trickle back into my now as it stands today. It's unwelcome presence in my now is affecting my better judgment and making me more weaker than better. My fight against the weaker me, is essential for me to be able to find some peace for my eternity. Without that goal to achieve, my existence feels lost and wasted. In the trapped hollow of that one wretched WHY, I cannot allow myself to despair and excuse all my wrongs. While being judged for my weaknesses, I pray for a renewal of strength, faith, and guidance from You, The One Who Knows Best, and to be saved from losing my way on the slippery road of pride and its other wretched brethren. In Your All Empowering Light I hope to be Enveloped, In Your All Healing Embrace I pine to be Held.

In aspirations thus I let my tears glide over my guilt and wrong doings that I am aware of, or not, and with this prayer I struggle towards some residue of peace to be found...

... InshaAllah, Ameen!