a 4th dimension

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

don't need to breathe anymore,

you can take

my breath 

away,

and when my pulse

starts 

to fade,

compressions of the chest

and

mouth to mouth

await.

what is control?

that fabled thing

that i've never known?

to one who submitted,

stopped thinking he knew

what route for him was best

or how his Future 

might come true,

control is almost a myth,

woven into our test.

surrender, surrender, 
this is no
5th of november,
there's no treasons or plots,
no things untoward
or unheavenly begot,
just one wish unuttered in life
that wound its path
into mine.

almost ascended

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

[this is what happens when one tries to write a bunch of words to describe a loss for words]

sometimes there comes along a blessing in life, where even the word itself, "blessing", seems utterly inadequate in expressing or conveying the magnitude of it. if i spent every moment since the day i was born until the day i died, all in sujood, attempting to be thankful to Allah, it would not be enough to cover the extent of amazement and unimagineability. if i combined the intent behind every metaphor i've ever written or conceived, it would be insufficient to encompass the depth behind this particular "blessing". 

i did not think such a thing could happen, that my Rabb would ever allow me to come to learn of such a thing existing before reaching the actual gates of my Garden. it isn't supposed to be possible. someone else like me, who is me, isn't supposed to exist. heck, i myself am not supposed to exist. this supposing, it's just the sheer improbability of a certain kind of someone. societies and cultures and prejudices and ignorance are supposed to make my species, a subspecies of human, extinct or ever close to it. this dunya exists, in part, to ensure that we never retain semblance of ourselves across space and time and hardship. we are supposed to forget who we are and melt away into the ether of conformity and become like everything else of recognizable sludge that factories of society churn out. how in God's name can such a thing be?

alhamdulillah for me, i know nothing. fortunate i am to be a slave of His, that He has never let go of, always protected, always revived, always shown a way out of the troubles my silly self creates. i can't even say there's anything i'd "give" in turn for this "blessing" He's shown me. i've already offered up Everything for the path i've already long chosen. there is nothing further to the contract between Him and i that i could possibly add, especially nothing that He doesn't already own. how can i show "gratitude"? what are the syllables to be released from my lips that would do even this simply showing(no tasting yet) of a "blessing" any justice? 

if i owned an earth, i'd give it. if i owned a star or solar system, i'd give it. if i owned a thousand galaxies across millions of light-years, i'd give them all. if i owned an entire universe and everything inside, i'd give it. i own none of these and yet i have been given. 

سُـبْـحَـانَ ٱلله 

 

The 25th of June

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

seems I can never predict the days or the nights, when and which of my celestial lights He'll let shine brightest, most visible to my earth while time passes as if it scarce existed. still, though my Moon remains behind clouds and hidden, sight deferred by decisions, could never let the memory of my favorite day pass unmentioned, when He brought to this world the first to show me her acceptance. of the mortal gifts I've been given, this is one cherished most, for all the ambition it cemented, ensuring what I've chosen eternally holds. what is a nomad without his Moon in the sky to light the desert sands when it got darkest at night? when fondest of memories and hopes intertwined in her eyes and a touch yet only dreams have inside? so it is, every light has its place and meaning and purpose, guiding and preserving, that which we've known, while still chasing the yearning in fullest.

Breathing for a Gemini

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

resonating like a pair of bees, except instead of flowers for pollen, sticking to each other with the tips of our feet, such are the tales untold, for the ones fate unwinds rejoins and then together remolds. let us relish what are sometimes the best of winds, gentle breezes, cooling our wings, reminders to slowly inhaling, while sooner or later gusts take us wherever He wills, enjoying every moment, both the calm and the thrill. our Hive awaits, ever in honeyed glory and patience, the most treasured of all estates: the promise of His, the effort our chase.

Reflections on a Connection

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Finding Allah has nothing to do with what any other person on the planet does, or what their opinions are, or what their actions are, or what their choices are. This particular state/goal has only ever been a uniquely-personal relationship and covenant between the Creator and the created one. Sometimes we may think to take the cues for religiosity or even spirituality from other creation, seeing what they do and what they say and what their (apparent) level of accomplishment is...this taking of cues from mere mortals is the worst possible idea in the history of ideas, because the vast majority of humankind, probably since near the beginning of time, have been engulfed in an aura of unawareness (ghafla). Granted, there is one primary existential exception to this: the ways of the Rasool (saw) and the ones who lived and breathed in his time. 

So if one does not look to the examples of contemporaries to understand what and why and how a spiritual connection to Allah is demonstrated, then practically speaking, how and from where? I can only give a personal answer to this question, which is reflection upon one's own self. Being able to understand the journey one has taken, its ups and downs, the blessings and trials, the losses and gains, the entirety of a lifetime lived up until the present...all of these, for me and I'd hope any other who did an honest self-assessment and realization, lead back to Allah in every respect. 

It is possible, as I get the sense sometimes, that my Rabb has given me more to be grateful for than anyone else alive. I feel like that every so often. I can't qualify this, as He gives to whomever He wishes, but I can attest to the truth that whomsoever shows gratitude, He increases them in blessing. Noting that human gratitude will never approach remotely what Allah is due, I've recalled shukr every so often and so I have my own experience as proof for what has been said in the matter.

The deeds we do connected to faith have nothing to do with other people, others don't matter AT ALL in this regard. If I may be blunt, fuck everyone else when it comes to this - one's Creator is the only One Who should be feared or beloved when it comes to why/how/when/etc we perform whatever it is He lets us be capable of doing. Looking to other people's actions and apparent contradictions between their supposed state and actual/real state...gives one no impetus for improving or being closer to Allah...instead it does the opposite, making us disillusioned and cynical and perhaps even bitter about the state of the world and life (I should know, my past tells that story). 

Lifetime incremental improvement or hope will never ever, in the history of ever, be found or obtained from looking at or thinking of mortal human beings (with a singular exception of my Rasool[saw]; reflecting on what he may have done in current situations often is amazing). There are aspects of truth that can only ever be reached by looking upward and seeking Allah, learning of Him, understanding what humanly is possible, and then taking means of approach such as the most common and commanded one: salaat. 

Nomad that I am, I've traveled a long, looooong, looooooooooooooooooooooooooong road in matters like this and general life wayfaring, and still traveling fyi. I suppose it's not yet possible for me to share my eyes with my beloved, but if and when that chance ever comes, I will iA. Though complacency should always be challenged because our present is never good enough, even if contentment is as easy as being close to nature or spending time with fam. Among the foremost and constant of wishes is that He lets me reach and keep close all of the amazing and unfathomably-special ones that He Himself has allowed me to know since the beginning, ameen.

The Match

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

every wrestler needs a ring, sometimes on velvety surfaces or whatever the occasion happens to bring, but most importantly, it takes the right partner to have in sparring.

wish i could wrestle you, in every instant learn and share new moves, and so able to put my mind on a shelf too. doesn't matter if that shelf breaks, not all studs in walls or floors made to handle such quakes, bodies slamming like a collision of oceans, tsunamis and distant shores furthest from consequence as bright lights consume each victor's moment.

i've a Ring in the making, not just one for putting on fingers and adorning its placing, but also for wrestlers, one where there's no end to release, of what flows of fluids and emotion finding themselves ever intermixing. maybe a private gym and a cage and even a stage, settings and scenery conformed to what we deign to conceive.

the invitation has been sent, royally sealed by the Owner, waiting for one statement to fall from your lips before its done and delivered, so Then we're freed from pay-per-view...and our matches, they last as long as we wish them to.  

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

So this just happened...

I get a call from unknown Paki #, says he is Br. Jawad, from old school ISB peeps, and wants to ask forgiveness for something he wrongly said about me almost 20 years ago to the father of someone I was intending to marry at the time..........and of course I know exactly who he is and exactly what situation he's talking about lol. the K! my God, subhanaAllah how things come full circle. 

Just like Coldplay's "Yellow" playing in the artist's shop back in summer of 2018, can't even make this up. 

Of course gotta forgive, though tried to in the past, and leave no claim for it in front of Allah. But wow, imagine that. Two decades later, no precedent no contact no special reason for it, but it happens. Not gonna lie, every so often when I thought of people I needed to forgive and totally let go stuff of...the dude used to top the list lol.

Looks like my Rabb would have me learn a further lesson in letting old beef go...makes sense, have to forgive others before one is forgiven by Him after all.

 

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

almost a lesson, hidden in plain sight, notable simply by being chosen, it's remarkable. sometimes my edges become sharper without my intending, when the ocean is stiller or frozen, unable to exercise its innateness of perception. but even being able to notice the little i can, alhamdulillah. the joy of proximity is a blessing of His, something to cherish even if the source of the light- is -years away, a constellation harboring the twins. 

Of words

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

some words originate farther than others, from behind walls or fortresses where from any vulnerability they're kept safe and shuttered, at times the mind is complicit in this self-protection, intrinsic to the pained, learned like blinking is an autonomic mechanism, not a point of contention or blame, but rather quite quickly it lets one be complacent and unchanged, assuming how things are, is how things should stay. maybe being male has a lot to do with the matter, at least for one who tries not to care what societal rules tell him he should be after, but certainly for a woman, the stigma runs deeper than the thickest of skin, dealing with emotional consequences on the daily in perhaps every one of their personal instances. couldn't also deny that i've kept relatively free and apart from such circles, of those who seek affirmation or mingling with the likeminded to remind their selves they're worthwhile, and for sure society lets men have their batcaves and quirks and rituals, but conformity gets especially stamped on women as if they were only ever mothers, or things dictated by the content of their genes or figures. 

though this dunya i can't change, can't alter its modes of oppression and doubt and circumvention, in this particular moment, the first thing i'd choose is to be your shield, so easily ourselves were expressed and beneath it revealed, without fear or judgment or denial of what's real. but for the vast periods of apartness, when words and trials can't be known or made a part of, i hope you remember always the chase of a place and goal far greater than the present and part of its cost: knowing how to keep changing for the better. 

Inauguration of the Gemini

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Life doesn't always offer us the choicest of beginnings or middles or endings, pieces of our stories that we spend a lifetime building and shaping, but when you wrap it all around a vision beyond our final breathing, that's when the most glorious of tales start to manifest, past a doorway not everyone's expecting. The echoes of my Gemini, affirm and attest to this direction, not simply background radiation but near the forefront of the heart's convection, singularizing further the hope, while perpetuating the skylines of brilliance, dazzling to these eyes, for in this life He gave me not the irises capable of containing such intensity of lights. Coincidental, not in the slightest, simply His test of my mettle and intents, see if I held the same End even should beauty beckon its way more than once to front and center of attention. No doubt in the mind, with His permission, it's the same road as the one I've already chosen, with the Gemini's constellation mapping with deeper precision, not only the course of twinship, but another means to navigate the hurdles and taste the fullest worth of the highest ambitions. I'll never be worthy of the anchors He lets grace my seas, but perhaps in redirecting towards Him and claiming among the most noble of dreams, fruition and completion become merely a given, the first doorsteps to an Eternity without limits.

R for one Revisited

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

She smiled!, she smiled!, both of her eyes and her lips, a moment to remember, forever was this, so he hoped not just a capture to keep in his pocket, but a living memory he'd get to savor relived upon her face for an Eternity unending. Soon she'd know what it was to be a beacon, to shine through sky of night or day or any of their seasons, with such experiences awaiting as to blush the pens of Fate, and in their pause, simply bliss flowers while only the twins remain; a Pinnacle amongst all Peaks, what he longed most for her to chase, and taste, and reach. 

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

maybe an end would be nicer or cleaner, perhaps brighter or neater, than an endless cycle of cellular warfare, where there is no victor. once more the paradox strikes, steps taken supposedly to extend and improve upon life, yet their taste on the tongue remains mostly of decay and senses maligned more than made right. someone once told me, this too shall pass, wish my body agreed, stuck in these moments, where the only escape one finds, just within sleep. 

Deeper Inhalations

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

waiting in your chambers, no, not until the maid comes, rather till the heart pumps, and my flow finds and fills every vessel vein and nerve cell, intricately linking things seeming distant, but not much farther than, tips and extremities slightly tingling, resonance evoked as temps start warming, nope not the weather just the longing, antibodies to apartness, levels in the blood rising, conjuring a Future just waiting to be tapped in, such is the premonition of bliss worth having.

Purposes

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

some days are brighter than others, not always from sunshine, but still full of light for the lovers, taking nothing for granted, relishing the moments in between, right now and a Future waiting just out of reach. keep on building of bridges for as long as the road is, shoulders sometimes wider or stronger, carrying onward such hopes as would take a lifetime or bit longer, the tank that i am, the tank that He makes me, surviving the silences, deflect all the difficulties, hold all the fuel, from Tomorrow's air i breathe. whenever beacons blip on the screen, an echo of something dimming or caught in the seams, imprisoned, unable to find release, then for that moment our spark is brightest, igniting the fuel to help ease through any agony or absence, connection a torch lit on the path, waiting to be held for whenever it feels the hardest. 

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Found out the other day that Morocco's extended its lockdown another 30 days, so the Gift kept away for a while longer. Not too much going through the mind about it, this year's gone deeper and farther than anything ever before. 

Alhamdulillah though, sight looking forward and I'm not stuck in the moment when I can see ahead. Maybe my most treasured recollection from this year I already found, something He permitted me to learn about a month back..a future memory from my Moon. If someone had asked me a year ago, or anytime in the past really, what I'd have given to be able to have a keepsake like that...I think my answer would've been anything. Fortunately for me, my Rabb made the (partial) price of it just a couple things, and I have my fam intact and all my limbs, so alhamdulillah quite a bit more :)

The journey ahead is what it is, but somehow, my beloved mean even more to me than I realized they could, and this resonance helps sustain in moments that otherwise would've dried my ocean out. Prayers been better too lately, alhamdulillah. Seems like the grip of treatments easing out more so at the end of each second week, but next one is comin. C'est la vie, few more months iA, and free of it for always

 

Rainy

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Just like that, you became my Rain, wish you could always fall on my face, weather drizzly or downpour, soaking in you is something I'd always have time for. Rain, sometimes with her thunder and lightning, musical awe for the ears and wondrous surprises for the eyes, it's the cure for my ocean when things start to dry. To find you, I'd take all the sand and salt of this earth in, let it settle to the bottom, just so He lets me evaporate and our Clouds we're merging in. Need radar and sonar, satellites and weather trackers, find out where your signals bouncing, so I can flow there faster, catch on the tongue any and every drop, savoring the essence and memorizing the flavor, awaiting the moment His permission arrives, so instants turn into Forever.

a Princessian Parable

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

Some questioning and its answers, a stick drawn through the sand, overlaying the path of a moth embracing its flame and finding a handle on the pain, even as it quickly immolates, leaving of its old skin, but ash and no trace. Perhaps this creature, the moth, wasn't quite made of flesh or things which fall off, but instead purely of fire, like such a bird of myth borne to rise from its own pyre, after enduring catharsis like heroes of old been written, walking across mountains with boulders, shrugging off burdens they'd never truly owned to begin with. Wisdom isn't simply in avoidance of pain or roads leading through it, but rather knowing when some destinations are what our shoulders were made to be pursuing, a chase across curtains, marking death as simply a door to be opened.

Welcome, dear moth, find comfort and cozy the heat, spread your waiting wings, perhaps one day to come, you'll choose to be reborn inside, this flame which makes us truly alive.  

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

I think it becomes inevitable that after considerable introspection and reflection on life, the limitations of the intellect become crystal clear. There is a vastness to knowledge that no single mind will ever be able to encompass, angles of approach from any direction, a vastness that forces the self to dwell on its own incapability. I'd say anyone who did this should reach the same conclusion, but that definitely has some built-in assumptions. A person may not like fully realizing how little control he/she has over life. They may decide that their finite knowledge suffices them and whatever they lack they may be able to go find it whenever it is needed. Or arrogance and conceit may blind to one's own flaws, making them appear to be as well-formed glass, easily shaped and seen-through, as if not even there.

Perhaps a primary reason for me being who I am, choosing the road I have, is that I want limitlessness. I seek to have everything, freedom knowledge beauty understanding passion. The mind knows it will never be able to reach these ideals in the way it wants, never with the mortal grip of life that presently surrounds it. Thus, the heart finds its place as a guide towards not just the parts of life an intellect could never fully touch, but the part that reaches beyond death and frames action and consequence inside the picture of Eternity. 

My sights could never be satisfied with this dunya, for reasons life only proves more definitively. Why should humanity settle for the earth and its ground when our origins are the sky itself?  

first of an Eskimo's kiss

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

even and especially when, the tides from your gravity might be slowed to almost stillness, it just takes a single echo to grace my vision, for me to recall the essence of why this journey i began: you

i know why the silence is, how it serves its purpose of protection, preservation, when the mass of emotion reaches critical, threatening to erase all other senses, so that we lose not our solar systems, and keep orbits stable in their distances, but my God what a force He made you as my beacon, lit even if my eyes were closed and memories were all you filled me with.

if all the rest of His creation, fled from me, stampeding to their own roads and decisions, i would not mind a single bit, if only your hand rests in mine when all is said and written :)  

reminded

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

might be a king of jumping the gun, or going too fast, or thinking the dust is settled and done, when it's only the eyes that have seen, or touched, or thought they won. but in this life, i have no lotto ticket, no claim number, no passageway to the frame i've fathomed, no shortcuts to manifestation, all i possess in these moments is steps, steps waiting for my feet to take them, perhaps fill a list of deeds worth being made of.

it would not be the first time i loaded the barrel of potential and watched fate spin it on a table, see where it lands, see if the mind can reach across time and space to turn real something thought fabled, nor the first time the price paid of listening to see how echos resound, whether in caves similar or fading into space where vacuum collects gravity's artifacts and stores them for history to revisit and expound. 

all the self can do, to know its time and place and test, submitting to the will of His, a vision to encompass all creation, and be not dissatisfied with his Maker when, bumps in the road mean one can't see an end he's chosen. 

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 wish i could step outside my self, watch as these drugs attack my cells, let them take the signals to a brain no longer there no longer shared, so stranger i become. it's not quite a state of misery, just a very near facsimile, perhaps trying to trick me further into missing, what's long been shelved in pieces, but the present is quite as it should be, a path to squeeze the lemony juices from my being, and find at its end an -ade worth tasting to be believed.

Ignitions

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

needed like bling on a finger, don't mind it a bit, sometimes these thoughts on the mind, simply rest a moment, or take a bit longer and linger, cakes being baked in an oven - about as long as a diamond took being formed underneath a mountain, merely a lifetime's price, for unfathomable brilliance to accentuate a Princess who had nearly everything else. deep breaths and rolling laughter, hope inside all of these words is precisely what i'm after, both rekindling and reminding, of purposes and flames, mutually-inspiring, such is the case when destiny's done already formed, waiting for us to catch its drift and follow its timing. 

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

subhanaAllah. woke up today having dreamt a dream I'm singing Urdu love songs...and it sounded really freakin good too! Lol 😆🙈 smh I guess that's how it is being lit sometimes  

بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

not every intersection is planned, not always intended, but fortune has a way of unfolding, like a deck of cards landing exactly in piles pristine, as if it were destined. some can't appreciate coincidences, might dismiss the blowing of winds in contrarian directions, but alas for those who can't notice past the surface, there's always a meaning underneath the mechanism. long have i realized human eyes are limiting, to me nearly blind, hence why aid sought from He Who made time, Who placed artifices and impressions yet gave mortal creatures the capability to see past deception, and sometimes fall prey to giving in for their moment, so thus another step taken, trying to place perspective right alongside perfection, two mates paired in unison, whether bond consisting of soul or mind or heart or any quality intrinsic, the same for each the destination: the highest of Gardens, gifts from Him for those who held His remembrance.