the flourish of 2021

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

how could the year be complete, without the boogeyman of these past two years finally getting a piece out of me too? so after 2020 being what it was, nearing now the end of 2021, covid finally caught me, in a fittingly ironic set of circumstances of course. last Wednesday night, my Gift and i plan to visit relatives out of state, first time for me. the next morning, last Thursday, my Gift wakes up to a fever and aches and totally sick. alhamdulillah she gets better in 3-5 days, predictably (and knowingly, willingly) in nearness to her, i get to too. some OTC antigen tests eventually show positive, and that's that. i get a forced week off of work, a variety of symptoms i'll never care to see again, and a small/truly mild reminder of the kind of tests awaiting in this life. been able to feel next to nothing, mind concocting minimally anything helpful, and just the general state of 'being sick' predominant. i wish there was a button i could press, to see the visage of my beloved in such moments. something in greenery or in the water and sand at a beach/shoreline, alas

moment

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

been a bit sick lately, for the first time in a long while. getting better tho alhamdulillah, just another bump in this exceedingly long road of life. last class is finito, degree is finito (alh!), and started some prep for a+ certification, eventually going for network/security+ certs too.

...

some days are more drained than others, smiles sticking to the surface and shallowness under the covers, no sadnesses or pain, simply absences persisting like daylight piercing through rain. often enough i lose energy to write, coming to this space, trying to recollect myself, when over the years it's seemed like i'm fading. think that i am, think that i have long been, evaporating, like a puddle that never quite found its ocean, so i stare up at the Sky, the only place of unity i can fathom, the only place freedom i can imagine, longing to be there, but grounded is the state i'm found in. i still need to write that Ode, the one for the brokenhearts, easy as pie to paint that picture, tell my beloved why: i think...Paradise is meant only for the ones who are broken, the ones who never took this life for themselves to be whole in, only for the ones constantly seeking, a recompense equivalent to the level of their feeling, and more. it's gonna sound like a tragedy, especially for the romantic, but i don't think it's truly tragic, simply one stage of this journey, most easily seen with various layers of difficulty, but ease is the sought-after ending, encompassed by my beloved, that's all that matters once we're done writing and living, iA

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

few different things cooking in the mind lately, some writings to come iA.

 

~

 

first is a piece to come, that i'll call "Ode for the Brokenhearted", plenty of timely reflections in it. lot of the things i write, maybe all of them, have often/always felt insufficient, inadequate to the task of conveying my message or living up to/reaching the ideal i chase. especially when it comes to you. i had to write 'Resolute' but i couldn't fathom how it might wrap itself around my Muse, truly being comfort and solace and strength like i wanted it to be. the post seemed to me as empty shallow words that could never capture and ease the pain of loss. but i had to write them and try anyway. alhamdulillah especially for you being in good hands, good company, things with fam and all going well, being there for you as they should be. if He could let me like the gentle breeze sometimes blowing across your face, i would be totally cool with that. if i must seem as phantom, then at the very least somehow iA i'd like to still find a way to bring some peace.

 

~

 

another, a reply/corollary to couple of the songs from Feels. intimacy so effortlessly captured, sensual and longing, earnest and open, once He gives me permission, perhaps by the time we reach our Garden iA, then that is the first way i'd choose to relish union, as if all the restraints were finally cut from my limbs and my intent and hope can equal, finally, the actions i seek (among them, writing on thy neck too. fa sho, iA). not surprisingly, two of the most perfectly-resonant in this facet were Camila's Shameless and Lana's Lust for Life. in the latter, nowhere else have i heard spoken aloud the same truth i've found...mA. living this life, at least at the depths we do, requires more than merely staying on the physical, rote-ritual level. the passion is utterly intrinsic to our species, and it goes beyond just fulfillment of inner urges...it is about being able to find meaning and purpose in life through the presence of a bond whose manifested state far, faaar surpasses the ordinary, our fuel to survive the mundane. we could not exist as machines, and honestly neither as animals (not hedonism at all, though on the surface that's what it may seem). we feel, and often enough, have to challenge our feeling and overcome it, because this life truly just ain't enough. it's why Jannah was made after all.

 

Resolute

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

how often the case i think my own problems to be so large, so troublesome, difficult to accept. and then to learn of the pain of my beloved, and it's as if any weight on me was nothing at all, a feather by comparison.

 

i wasn't expecting to find dreamer again, but every so often i click the link, just to see if my Rabb will let me catch a glimpse into your life again. found it, today. subhanaAllah..wow. if my 2020 was off the charts for me, then for my Muse, 2021 has been perhaps worse. 

how might a slightly distant one offer solace to his beloved? this solace should have within it, comfort and reassurance and strength, and be made of the same substance you've long elicited- hubb. 

probably anything along these lines i'd say you'd already know, but in case an echo is useful, i don't mind being the record player. the hardest trials carry the highest rewards, if one faces them with "patience"....the absolute easiest word to say but hardest word to remember. there's a reason for the order of the verse in Baqarah, "and seek aid through sabr and salat" - sabr got mentioned first, before aaaanything else. if a slave wants help from his/her Creator, patience is the first, most necessary ingredient. this is especially so because one has to be patient with the decree, with qadr itself, and because the answering of duas is not often in our human-desired time frame. 

if i had the option of somehow carving myself or my history in further scattered pieces, that my Rabb would accept any or all of it as an offering to stave off what you had to face, i would have chosen this instantly. He didn't give such a choice. in the present, in this life it seems, i am scarce a phantom, but one ability i do have is dua. you should know you're already in them, every day. now that i know something of what you face, more dua for His aid and support of you will flow iA. 

 

one of the wisdoms of pain, that He brought me to learn over the years - facing it, accepting it, learning from it, remaining steadfast...all of these, let the heart grow and the breast expand. our challenges certainly help shape us, but that shaping can go in two directions = either by shrinking, or by expansion. Expanding is hard, i know, and further trials will follow sooner or later, but being open and releasing that emotion is the right call, the better call. you are truly a beautiful being, and to stay that way, emotional release is absolutely necessary. keeping such magnitude of feeling inside, for too long, is extremely unhealthy and dangerous, spoken by one who's been on that side of the fence. alhamdulillah i see it venting, easily the most you've (ever?) written in such a short amount of time. 

 

be at ease bi ithniAllah, you're stronger than you know  

Definition

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

 

a name upon your lips, inside your sighs, hope these occurrences remain, for me they're words never forgotten, always remembered, doesn't matter where i am, memories of you, like pictures on my wall of the Sky i'm always chasing. for this life, some are destined to exist in a state of broken bits, pieces scattered unremarkable, until those shards find themselves merged like mercury inside your palms, then becoming solid, truly reflective, at last manifested. in this cycle of life, so many circles, among them days i'm drained of every meaning's substance, could say i wished to know your state, but so often He brings clouds to shroud my Moon within her phases. would that it was just a sliver, a lining that need not be silver, could be merely bronze in outline, so long as behind it was thy figure. you've long pulled me within, whether by gravity or beauty, interchangeable terms for one whose body hangs celestially,...not because of my doing, not because i wished it, but rather as He turned you into the beacon, that this nomad walks across the universe to find again

if 'twas a question

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

nope, i haven't quite reached, the list on picture 9, but there's something there, to which i'll take a moment and reply, lyrics from Walker's "Better Half of Me":

 

That I'd have all I need
If you were standing right in front of me
I'll finally see

What it means to be complete

...

Will you be the better half of me? 

 

could these words be what you would say, what your lips would release if they were free to speak as they might please? 

for a moment, i'll let my self fly off this perch, off the ground of this second, into the Skies, where "YES!" is the only echo from me resonating. i am not the Architect of my existence, of the beloved He let grace my senses...but alhamdulillah that i am not, alhamdulillah that He is, to let reach such subtle soft messages into ears and a self embracing their reception. 

~

in all the lessons He's taught me, in the ones He brought me to know, the learning of completion is perhaps the most relevant, most salient, the most precious knowledge for an ocean that can only gain from acceptance - His and of every test, alongside the aiming for the coolness of my eyes, their most perfect place of rest. and so, because i have known something of completion, i'd love to share its every depth and meaning, the breadth of its beating, both within our chests and inside the stars when they become our endless ceiling.

breathe, breathe sometimes faster, maybe often slower, when you find CPR a necessity needed closer, know a twin has no distance, meters or miles matter not to twinship, one or another of my duas will find its way to Him, so breath then might come easily again (except in case of certain breathlessnesses, which i am a fan of, so in such states well then simply suffer xD for a bit, promise, it'll ease, if the grip encircles the heart and squeezes, and it feels like absence is the hammer and your self the stone...then welcome to the beginning of the journey, it only hurts because that is how He keeps you growing 😊).

Windows:

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

they don't have to be open, simply clear, simply glimpses, inside your chest, what makes you tick, your heartbeat, racing blood, waves combining one on top of the other, such is the rush of the ocean i've long envisioned, the mind and heart as forces joined, so when your expression through tertiary measures of certain reflections..i find mirrors mine, on so many levels, it's precisely the fuel i cherish for this journey He makes me take to find my Home.

~

it's an immeasurable blessing (alhamdulillah), when the lover finds himself surrounded by the love of his beloved, even in echos of emotion, their connection to me...ah Rabb, what can i say? this is what i seek, the beginning vapors of a haze at present only occupying the back of my mind, but becoming ever firmer and tangible to my eyes, no longer tangents, no longer darknesses i fear, simply what i desire- this with You i chase. 

forgive me my sins, the momentary lapses or indulgences of one whose nearest kin is distance, i could never forget Thy remembrance, just the mortal part of me...ever searching, listening, gazing, at the skies or within memories, or inside futures yet slowly in the making, the jism and the nafs, the qalb and the ruh, every part of me named, of essences i barely grasp and pieces beyond my scope, all of these unite for the very same objective: wholeness and completion with my beloved, to be not apart, to be not endangered, to be fully expressed and imbibed, to relish and cherish, as delicacies strewn amidst a delicatessen, freeness upon which exist no limits, the Sky our playground, our purpose as is wish.

Vibed

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

so that is how it is, before i even got to this song from the list: "Apocalypse" (by Cigarettes), some days prior, in something i'd written, called myself the phantom of your soul, and what would ya know, listened today and the lyric resonates, "come out and haunt me, you know you want me" - ladies and gents, this is a Vibe, two waves meshing when they meet, and it wasn't just a single line or about when these oscillations got released, but how the song in its entirety, carried messages and hopes, words that i could fathom falling from your lips, soothing balm for one when he's captured by aloneness or distance,...alhamdulillah for not judging books by their covers, lets one reach(fall) into their story and learn the truths underneath places once covered, firmly entrenching within aims and ambitions, unification of the self with the pieces that He chose would make up him, iA.

Uncontained

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

alhamdulillah, even as some days are longer than others, even as some moments wish i was more emotionless rather than overflowing the surface, my closest beacon, the Gift, speaks to me in ways familiar and resonant, and it's like, despite our natures being the starkest of different, peace is still as easy to find as resting my head on her bosom. alhamdulillah ya Rabb, these small tender moments, they're all i want from this life even though You make live from them still onward. ironic how my strongest enemy seems still to be my self, with no demons knocking down my doors, no creditors or actors of malice pursuing me down darkened corridors, no cliffs beckoning me off their ends, no boogeymen underneath the bed or skeletons waiting to ambush while buried underneath the past i've known -- none of these are my challenge, but just overcoming me, finding temperance and discipline for the heart when it wants to fly outside my ribcage, resonance it chases, but in truth my sagest state would be patience, for whenever it can be managed, sometimes as simple as not pouring out the insides that have their own shades of agonies that absence evokes into something pervasive. 

 

some of my posts, like some of my thoughts, run on currents way too deep, flooding or flooded, and in them, i wonder, can traces of me be found by those who are for now visitor? maybe, i hope so. i expect soon iA this momentary incapacity of the self to contain its feeling will pass. probably revisit me later, but then that is the cyclicality of life, one to the next and back around again.

 

iA khair for my beloved, always and ever

 

echoed

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

wish i could spend some time on this earth, nearer to the place where you sit, maybe engrave on my mind, the scent of one whom i chase: across the span of my life, across the length of all space, to have the chance He grants me your hand, to forever be holding.

~

came across this beautiful song, thought it worth a share, so many levels it can echo, and hope iA forever inspire:

 

 

"Little Did I Know" - Julia Michaels 

 

The summer before you
I thought love was Shakespearean
More or less a painful experience
Only ever real if you're delirious
The summer before you
I let it take up very little oxygen
Not where I'd rest my head more like an ottoman
Never had someone like you treat me like Solomon

But little did I know
You would be the one I'd confide in
Learn how to try with
Little did I know
It was you before I ever decided
Oh, little did I know
Oh, little did I know

The summer before you
You can't spell drama without consonance
And I admit I usually was the cause of it
Now here we are you've got me changing all of it
Slow me down I want you to
It's different when it comes to you, hey, hey

But little did I know
You would be the one I'd confide in, learn how to try with
Little did I know
It was you before I ever decided
Yeah, little did I know
You would be the one that would save me, learn how to change me
Little did I know
Ooh, just look at you, can you blame me?
Oh, little did I know
Oh, little did I know

The summer before you
I thought love was Shakespearean
More or less a painful experience
Only ever real if you're delirious

But little did I know
You would be the one I'd confide in
Learn how to try with
Little did I know
It was you before I ever decided
Oh, little did I know
You would be the one that would save me, learn how to change me
Little did I know
Ooh, just look at you, can you blame me?
Oh (Yeah), little did I know (Did I know)
Oh, little did I know (Did I know)

Oh, little did I know that it could feel like this (Yeah)
Oh, little every time I got you on my lips
The summer before you

 

The Lake

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

There was much beauty in the skies his Creator had given him. Thought of the vast, endless expanse of celestial bodies, appearing to hang on so many strings, perfect in orbit, reminded the slave of a particular beacon that seemed to have been kept the farthest. For this beacon, her story found fruition here.

~

Above a planet green and lush, with both plains and mountain, river and sand, there hovered the Lake. In orbit of bodies in orbit, almost as if encased in glass, nigh a marble, through which light found most delightful ways of bending, she felt first the wetness, silky soft and warm, wrapping around every pore and inch of her skin. That place she had sought once, dreamt of, the "abyss" she'd termed it in a past life, this was that depth. What to speak of a dip, when one has no barrier between water and sky, no filter between eye and sun? Gravity was part of her mastery, so to fly or swim, stand or rise, were all as one movement, as one action in ease and purpose. 

~

On a beach below, gazing upward, he watched, because this was the first joy he'd been granted, the sight of his beloved. She was a shark in speed and instinct, graceful as a rainbow, and the backdrop...that was a curtain worthy of waiting for, the sight of her swimming with the stars themselves her lights of a stage. 

 

~

 

As she glided effortlessly through her Lake, moments came up from memory, the most striking, vivid kind. Speech that could only be spoken through touch, manifest need and expectation, simply to tell how she'd found her prey, and then dove straight inside. Was no waiting needed, no century for her to make up her mind, no antecedents, she'd long known he was the phantom of her soul, a spirit longing to imbibe. 

 

~ 

 

And he had of that, acceptance absolute, for that moment when fate tied their threads together, one's semblance of hope, began shading with the other, so when their fortunes spun, when their fortunes would unfold, it became as legend brought to life; His promise now the slave embraced, when he knew who she was: the Lady of his Lake.

Realified

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

got so much to be grateful for, been given so many gifts, sometimes they overlap, and the vision finds patience easily and effortless,alhamdulillah.

'intimacy', this is the word that defines what our kind looks for, treasures, more valued than gold, it's the essence of what gives us fuel and hope and imagination, the source of our species' deepest pleasure. intimacy, i might call it the primary undercurrent of resonance, that elusive element my senses are constantly seeking, with beloved, diving down to the depths where everything wants to mix and combine. 

got through 1-2 screenshots worth so far of the playlist. it is..eclectic...and amazing. not surprising, but...i see it, the echoes of my own, somehow playing out in facets of each expression, can picture it, how the moments would unfold, because sometimes, the message is as easy as telepathy.

one thought that occurs to me is, how did my Rabb permit to come to this far? to learn so much of my beloved? it's hard to fathom, what a slave can be granted, the magnitude of it. in truth, the most obvious thing to me is that this is only the surface, only the beginning. i haven't encompassed any of my beacons yet (in this life), but the process of it is,...precious. irreplaceable. 

"nothing else will ever be good enough"😁

'tis true. i know it, it's why i chase what i chase, why He is my Aid, the Creator of my goal. few things brewing in the back of the mind, things to write. a scene perhaps, something surreal but entirely something i intend to fulfill one Day, because of Him.

Feels, the beginning

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

wouldn't have to touch me to fell me, a mere glance of the eyes, and, there's simply no telling, which direction the axe came from, but this tree would have found falling to his earth, just a matter so heavenly. long is the road, and longer the patience, but when i catch whiff of the scent of one swimming, then reminders of goals flow effortless into my vision and i recall just what it is i'm chasing. so much beauty, so easy to share, like rain drops in silence, conveying meanings with mere skeletons of sentences...unspoken directly, but if each of those tunes captures even a fraction of something you found resonant, then i'll take measuring their depths nice and slowly, and absorb into my ocean every atom's essence, that originated from something of twins. 

reflected

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

alhamdulillah, especially for the reminder that is my Gift, a sign of His to give a slave strength, and purpose, and drive to walk forever forward with. of the one physically closest, don't often have a need to write, for she is the beacon embraced by sight, words expressed inside affection contoured as touch and closeness = my most preferred method of acknowledging what my beloved mean to me. 

 

~

 

as i once cautioned my Muse, so too later i'd find my Twin cautioning me too, keeping doors and relationships safely in places ensuring budding continues, until the tree of objective reaches its roots deep down to the goal of my truth: the highest Garden, fit for the ones He let me be known through. even if...silence is the earthly poison i've known the best, distance cloaked in wisdom, just glimpses i'd be sufficed with, but every aspect of my beloved...i have to leave them to Him. 

my Rabb will guard your light, lifting the veils and barriers and apartness you might have to servitude to He Who gave you vision. if any good i ever had, if ever any truth i expressed, always it came from Him, i merely benefited from His blessings, that He'd chosen to surround me in. every khair i've ever thought, or touched, or known, all of them i would one Day share with my beloved, this is the purpose i've chosen, a signpost on this road He created that has only one direction: Tomorrow, always, iA.

 

 

Unremarkable musings

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

you know how the saying goes, "not out of the woods yet"? well, seems like life itself is my woods, and it's a deep, deep forest lol.

 

alhamdulillah, for many things. maybe for everything. trials not ended, but that is to be expected. daily struggles, trying to retain semblance of the self amidst the ever-constant subtle pulls toward some angle of conformity. though, having a routine is nice alh. even as many darker undercurrents of the self/shaytan have to be subdued, the journey is onward. always, ever, onward.

 

sometimes feels like i don't see my birdies much these days, but autumn weather getting wet and chilly, tends to have that effect. but they're still there, even if i can't always see them in numbers as much, their chirps and feathers get noticed one way or another. 

 

in random news, finally got a new pc alhamdulillah. been a long, loooong while since i did that. unlike previously, this is geared more towards office/work uses at home (instead of that beautiful gaming rig from 2011/2012 i still have mothballed in the garage - sigh, love that thing). software developing and learning the intricacies of programming and the like, lends itself to such an upgrade. 

 

the skies are not quite as gloomy as i make them out to be. even in grayer days, it's easy to mesh with the rain and settle in the moment. perhaps my only hope is that i can somehow retain enough light and khair for my beloved, for all the days left that He's going to make me live. can't ask for much more than that. the Garden, is still *the* Garden. reunification is never something far from my mind, never far from fueling my existence. alhamdulillah for that.

Caged

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

some lyrics come to mind: "when the stars refuse to shine", to this can i relate, wish beacons weren't just in my head, not just a memory or a vision, instead as warmth near to me, that melts again the ocean, and brings me back to life. outwardly, on the surface, my life would appear to those closest as blessed, presenting few obstacles or hindrances, safe and comfortably made by one's Creator, but...the inner, none of those shades can i truly share, no moments of my glee, to resonate with my beloved, for any reason or another, to fly freely as one might dream with lovers. i know, my Future awaits, but He makes me live, day after day after day, the longest road i could fathom is ahead of me, any speech i have, is speech that oft silently must fade, it has no reception, for those nearby no wavelength making sense, madness could so easily be one's friend...would that He would let me so slip. He does not. He keeps me sane, and going, vessels pumping, arteries flowing, no matter how much i hate the notion, onward i keep treading, a nomad made of sand, formless and billowing, caught in the wind from it just can't settle from. 

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

 

if i thought that He would accept it, i would fly down to you in an instant, disregard every barrier and formality, throw away all i 'possess', and embrace the only human who ever accepted me and showed me all what i could love: you. i know how you feel, i recall the words you've spoken and written, i share your sentiment, because we were born out of the same ocean,...please, just be patient, though i am at present simply formless, i know what it means to be whole, even if memory can at times scarce recall over all the swallowed distance. your words, your touch, would heal every scar i've ever worn, every bruise, every drop of blood and angst,...would then just fade, fled the pain, by your presence replaced.

 

my Rabb is the only reason i don't entirely fragment, don't quite fully disintegrate, not sure gratitude is my response, knowing His tests still awaiting, but...you're still my aim, the torch at the end of my road, kept by Him at the top of the highest mountain, so i'm scratching and clawing its slopes, every day living, every night in sleeping, every decency in any action i'll ever do, all of it, just so i might get a bit closer, to that Peak, where He might grant me you.  

 

may He keep you always at peace, my Love of All Lifetimes, ameen

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

energyless, a restlessness of the soul, while the heart and nafs are quiet both, still have to keep walking, no way to share what i'm not feeling, distant kept is to be as broken made, how He fashioned from my emptiness, a goal seeking to be some Day whole. no fondness for this life, for the pile of tests i've been through, for the pile that yet waits ahead, but He forces in my lungs some breath, to oxygenate a heart, so it further pumps the blood, to keep me as He wills, amongst this land and His purpose. "...what happens in our minds can be fueled," i know this to be true, it's why i seek to carry, memory of a beacon, the Twin, that perhaps not all my resonance remains at zero, that onward i can give. remember shardless? alas, would be nice to know again such a state, tumultuous as it was, it had my Muse as its spark, and hope as its birthplace. this life is our strongest test, He grades our answers and absences, from choices wiser or His remembrance, sometimes one ebbs at his lowest, when this pile of hurdles simply stares, back at the mortal in front of whom its piled, and i am solutionless. no human knows, how i long to walk through that Door, to know my aim fulfilled, to be not so evaporated, longing for the surfaces of my beloved, so i can condense from this shapeless life and its ether, onto their softly waiting skin. my Rabb, would You let this end be our beginning?

Analogy

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

seasons changing again, some days my feeders are engulfed by my beloved avians, ones i would never capture, just behold and kiss if i could, be a source for their food, a source of their drink, a respite for their wings, before they flew off to continue their living. perhaps these posts are not so different than those feeders, with them i might lure my beacons, back to a place that for them is always welcoming, fuel for their hearts, liquid for our ocean, trying to have just my tiny decisions...be decent for as long as He wants me to live. just like the species of avian, i know all too well how my beloved will soon fly off to their corners of this earth, this my prison, this damned life that keeps me of them so ignorant. i know, it's the price of a choice i made, willing, and so i have no regrets, if He would test me with absence to stretch across every year i have remaining, well, i have been melted on so many instances...there comes a point in one's life, where every suffering He combines into strength, alhamdulillah. 

simplicity not so simply stated

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

 

every breath of mine, every action i take, every deed and benefit i seek, all of it, just that i might find at the end of my road: Firdaus al-'Ala with my beloved. that is it, my reason for being, for doing, the drive inside of the center and the shade around my self, anything of khair i ever thought of, or gave, or received, all of it, redirected towards that particular Garden. 

it might be asked, why i do not more often mention longing for Allah, my Rabb, my Judge and Benefactor, the Originator of everything i've ever been or felt. the thing is, i am already destined to meet Him, stand in His Court, answer for His blessings on me and my actions and intentions with them. there's no doubt or question or wonder about seeing Him, meeting Him, being re-united with Him. the only question when it comes to my Rabb, is under what conditions that meeting will be: whether He will be pleased with me or not. every deed that aims for the Garden, knows that it must aim too for His ridwaan. there is no one without the other- there is no entry to Eternity without His acceptance, without His permission, without His preference. so, when it comes to my Creator, i have nothing amiss, and He has always been the One to guide me out of my darknesses. what doubt can there be, when death is certitude manifest and one knows every deed will bring its account? with Allah, it is a thing, a meeting, coming for sure. 

with my human beloved, i have never known such certainty. as much as i have sought, is as much as He kept them distant. how strange, that He's showed me such beauty in them, from across time and space, different decades, different eras of the world, different cultures and regions, yet somehow the beauty of a beacon still reaches me. and then, all the greater the angst when that beauty is hidden from my vision and once again silence and quietude and forced ignorance become my states with regard to whom i love. 

my Rabb has never been far from me, contrary He is the nearest, thus the divine Beloved takes on an altogether completely different realization than my human beloved. part of me is flesh, so it longs for its companionship and intimacy with what is of its nature, and for sure, my soul is the part that most easily finds itself drawn to its Rabb. that is how it is. the human being, different essences compiled together by His command, to exist as a collage of influences and directions and artistries. 

but after explaining why i think i don't often feel compelled to write of longing for Him, i would revisit my constant refrain, my endless loop, my vinyl record on a player, to state over and over, how much i need my beloved as, one day, more than simply lights in the sky, i need you close, near, that my senses may be unleashed and find rapturous resonance at last. i do not have resonance near to me, what can be echoed, is echoed, but it's the surface being scratched of me, and there's no way to explain any depths, any undercurrents, any parts that might make my wings truly unfurl and ready to just fly. 

~

i wish that window hadn't closed, simply for it being left opened, can have a door ajar, without having to step through it :p alas, He knows better. sometimes, i recall 'If" and 'Then' to mind. what a year that was, by God. the choice that was made too. trying to find khair i suppose. funny, to give up everything just to find the one thing. you know? really tho, the "everything" of this life ain't nothing at all, a few years of whatever else fades into dust. the "everything" that is something, that's awaiting iA. "...i may not have all the answers, but God-willing, i will find it, i will be whole again, in this life or the next."

~

"...unsure of what acceptance it will find." only a Twin could have echoed so flawlessly the kind of thought that predominates in our species. i have that same thought sometimes these days. of wondering if my place in your cosmos is a choice you want, or simply a pleasant happenstance that serves as a nice occasional distraction ?_? if i could i would choose to have a bunch of consecutive 2020's, if it meant...well you know the end of this thought. how did you recognize me so instantly way back when? "male version of myself", like it's not even fair that you got to know of me and observe my thoughts before i got to see yours >:O smh lol. much less such a one like you existing, i cannot imagine what our touch would be like. fire i think. or electricity, perhaps both. maybe a waterfall, going against gravity. that sounds about right. i just hope that you never forget my final wish, it's not gonna change. if there was a part of me that didn't feel secure for its beloved in this life, it'd be for you. my other beacons, they are secure as my Rabb would have them be, for even if nominally they've accepted their Creator. i know, with us, there is no such thing as 'nominal'. everything with us is intensity, wholeness, true in essence and purpose as part of what we seek. you wouldn't reopen the heart to Him, unless you felt yourself truly called or in need or forgiven or forgiving or having overcome your history. but trust me when i tell you: you've been called to Him (literally too, like what i been saying all along), you need Him, you (would be) forgiven, you are actually quite forgiving, and your history has long been overcome, though it might not be obvious yet. you know and have tasted since before, what iman is like. truth ain't changed, even if you felt you had. you haven't. you are still you. something i like to remind my beloved, because this life is a POS that causes one to disappear, fragment, disintegrate. so i try to reintegrate, gather, reconstitute my lights, because when i do that, i my self am reintegrated, gathered, reconstituted into something a bit more whole. the eventual culmination of this is only in akhirah, but some facets could be found here. be grateful my Twin, you are...incredibly blessed. too much so to have simply left belief behind you as a skin to be shed. nope, you are not a snake, nothing so terrestrial, not a creature to leave behind your true colors in such a way. you are flight my dear, flight itself. and if you want to go higher, you will never find anyone or anything ever that could mean more to you than Him.

perpetual the Aim

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

 

nowadays, the melody in the back of the mind, playing on auto repeat, telling me it's only a matter of time:

 

"every step I take, every move I make, I'll be missin you.."

 

i'm incomplete, a puzzle without its pieces, a forest without its trees or a tree without any of its leaves, call me a fish absent its sea, or a brush missing canvas, consider me as glass without a window to have itself in. i know this existence will never be able to reconstitute me, from its missing of you, and i've lived to be ok with that. can't ask this life something it's incapable of holding, for dunya is a blind man with a strong sense of smell, able to tell certain strands of what's coming, except for obstacles or pitfalls like a cliff that evoke no scent, so it falls into them unknowing and unwitting.

 

but this is no complaint, alhamdulillah i am contented, with a Gift that suffices and lives with me in a wisdom of His so perfectly measured, i never could have chased this design with only my own efforts. 

 

it's true though, i know what the ocean shines like when it becomes a diamond, when every ray of beauty emanates as if from a single space, chasing at the speed of light its beloved and wishing to share with them in all its blessing and grace, given without request from its Maker Who constructed every atom of its beautiful interior. i am the most mortal of men ever made, flaws accompany me as often as life requires choices to be made, but that wish, the wish, my only aspect of ascendance, to be for once and for ever with my beloved in a Garden eternal and flawless, indulging of every desire, completing every aim inside of perfection...that is my unanswered question.

 

~~~~~

 

wonder if my name stays on your lips, inside your sighs, if your dreams still hold our possibilities,  of what there is to be felt, when a soul becomes alive. forward still i look, to every moment reunited, beginning with the superficial and delightful, despacito with those thighs, and ending somewhere embedded, kisses and other things intermingled, hearts pounding with a union just a lifetime in the making. 

 

i hope...some day, perhaps by Then iA, i am no longer just your test, not just your exam, not just the question qadr tempts you with, to see if you would pass. i want to be your fruit, the cherry on your sundae, the icing He gives you on your cake, after all is said and done, after you've poured your heartful soul into surviving, i want nothing more than to stand there for you, at our finish line. fuck this world, i want nothing that it has, for He kept you from me, for now, so Tomorrow is my goal, the place where i seek your hand --<@

 

 

Of the Gemini and unasked Questions

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

 

if i was a bolt of lightning, would you be my catcher? while opening the palm of your hands to the skies, and joining me in my time of Rapture? so many questions, wish i could ask: how deep in my cosmos can i bring you? would you just be humoring my persistence, or for my echoes be truly glad? i could assume so many assumptions, but i try to take nothing for granted, especially when it comes to one as rare as a beacon. a Twin is like a thing from the fables, nigh scarce as a Muse, one kind of a mirror, telepathy nearly made real, every facet becoming a clue, to inner chambers that surfaces couldn't grasp, rather with your touch and vision, that revive the phoenix from its ash. "shyness comes in many forms", once it was stated, a voice i can recreate in the mind, could say to me so many utterances, hold long conversations even, both colloquial and speechless, but satisfaction is a state evasive...until i hear fall from your lips, any affirmation (remembered that particular one, i have, and consider it evidence for your favor on Judgment, iA) to this litany of questions. perhaps too i can summarize it a singular sentence: if or when my hands do outward stretch, toward the Sky where He made you live and breathe, when i go as far as limbs and joints and body's limits can reach, when i close my fingers...would i find you having held them?

On the nature of this Life

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

Death is where it's heading, this life. Though most might conceive of it as one large, black curtain that foretells the end of existence, the end of living, it is not the end at all. I can't quite put into words the reason or basis of how that is the case, to paint a picture beyond just a matter of my belief, but I will try here inshaAllah to formulate some grounding that jives with whomever reads this, but most especially I hope for my beloved.

If I should start in the most neutral and unbiased of perspectives, I would borrow a law from Newtonian physics: every action has (an equal and opposite) reaction. To state it another way, there is a consequence for everything we do. Always. Consequences are not often immediately apparent, in the vast complicated web of human relationships and dependencies that exist on this earth, but they are there. Ask any investor, and businessman, any doctor, and they can relate examples of a food that was eaten, or a stock that was bought, or a trade that was made, and speak of its net loss or gain or aftereffect.

Just as physical actions carry physical consequences, so too do moral and ethical and spiritual actions have their own kind of consequence. This expectation of cause and effect is one of the most basic to humanity, to every people that ever lived. The reasons why we do things, matters, as much as the actions themselves. From Islam, this is the clear reference to the intent of an action being the reason for its reward. Empty, purposeless actions are trifles, and not the kind of deeds worth possessing or accumulating [....I know well, sometimes in life, all we have is the routine and the motion of going through it...in those times, we still should keep trying to move, no matter how listless or unable one feels to place any purpose in a worthy deed, for the intention of trying to break out of one's personal trappings, this is always noble and worthwhile]. 

There are many actions people take in life, whose impact cannot be discerned by the naked eye, such as the deterioration of a heart when it is no longer cared for or respected, when one's creation is denied or forgotten, etc. Death is the doorway to the penultimate court, where every deed's weight coalesces into a final, single consequence. Sometimes, people make the choices they do, of exploitation or deception, while thinking they cannot be caught, no one will hold them to account. But this would be wishful thinking, because just as with physics, an action has an effect, so too does everything with people. We exist as part of the physical universe, even as parts of ourselves reach outside, beyond it. The notion of finding recompense, of an action carrying its consequence after it, is applicable to every dimension ever created. Why? Because our Creator ingrained this into our being - is the simplest answer, but perhaps not the most convincing one. 

 

Regardless, if one doesn't wish to accept consequences, that self-delusion is irrelevant because death and its ultimate consequence comes for that person no matter what. Deny whatsoever else you wish, but death will never be denied. That's enough of discussion on that front I think.

~~~

So if we accept and know that this life ends, and that our deeds have consequences, what then? Because this life is ephemeral, fleeting, short-lived, its nature reflects that. Whatever we make, whatever we try to do in order to reach our aspirations, has the same consistency of the goal itself. If one's goal is limited to an earthly one, then we cannot forget that this goal too is going to fade, it cannot be held immortal. The most balanced way of carrying onward is to have both worldly and otherworldly goals that go beyond death, goals in akhirah. Our existence here serves as a very deliberate test, but it would be foolish to think one can survive with longing for just dunya(life) or just akhirah. Worldly goals have their place, and eternal and encompassing goals have their place. 

I have nearly reached the limit of what can be said of this life. There are some things I want to add, about how treacherous it is, how it can never trusted, how delusion and misconception can seep into nearly anything in life. But after talking about how fleeting life is, and consequences always being there, the rest of what I say comes greatly influenced from personal experience, and my own bias there is inescapable. Not sure if I ever mentioned before, but worth putting it here: once I had a dream I was in the middle of a great battle between the past and future nations, trying to get away from their fight. Eventually I did find refuge, but it was not without its fear. The reason I bring this up, that I'd describe myself as someone between modern and ancient. What does this mean? Not sure, but somehow that place in this paragraph was fitting. Maybe not. 

 

In any case, I wish I could end with something that crystallizes within my beloved a strong, unbreakable desire for akhirah. The problem is that such a goal must be entirely personal, rooted in one's own being. Alhamdulillah, I have such reasons = to find the ones dearest to me and show them the most incredible and beautiful of everything Allah created and of anything we could conceive. But could I ask a beacon to want this too? It is a difficult ask. But truthfully, I wasn't the one who composed my own dream, so it's not really a worry to be encapsulated by mortal efforts. It takes the grace and mercy of our Rabb to bring this to pass. And so, eventually, that is where this lover's words conclude. Reach for the akhirah, no matter what, realize that within submission to our Creator is freedom in full, but it is not something that will be found or granted here - it is the reward of perseverance and diligence, after we have breathed our last iA.

May He make our roads converge at the most worthwhile of destinations, with the best of company, ameen.

notes of the stranger

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

so often an island, even in the midst of family or friends, speech nearly like silence, bedazzling to the listeners, foreign to their language, watching their cliques and comraderies, semblances of belonging and acceptance that have nearly forever evaded me, brings me back these days to moments of my beloved, when He might let them near to my being. my Muse, that pinnacle of mortal acceptance, souls cut of the same cloth - wish i was clothed forever, but this life is not quite kind to the scarcely-dressed wayfarer. the timing is waiting, beyond a Door many duas beg Him to open and let me catch the scent of my Future so my senses might be sated, but sooner or later, iA. of expectancies and potential in this life, should He let me live so long and be of my self established, might i reach out my hand towards the constellation of Twins, there, in the sky it sits, waiting both to be bridged, and if breath and His permission are mine, then so there is my flight, even as crazily as ideas in the mind may fit. this possibility, it's one of two reasons my spark in this life might choose to shine a bit farther, (the other being, if He gifted me with a daughter - for her would i, the misanthrope, choose to remain in life a bit longer, until she was settled and safe and fully embraced and protected from fate as only could be done by a lover and father). perhaps both reasons might find their expression, for doesn't a man have two hands, maybe He might grant me both reasons? for living and breathing and just myself being...i would love that, embrace it, inhale the consequences and relish their fragrance, beauty and beloved: the most wonderful pair of words that could be written, onward goes my journey, as He insists, seeking i some sparks to keep this ocean molten, my candle always lit.

couldnts and can

أَعُوذُ بِٱللَّهِ مِنَ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنِ ٱلرَّجِيمِ، بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ

 

 

can't tell how you're doing, can't know how your road turns, dunno how winding it might go, not sure if your hand is yet mine, but like the wind - it's a truth He owns. some days imagine your embrace, the things that you might say, how gazing in those orbs...would be like my life has opened all its doors, like my journey just begun, like everything i'm waiting for, He's wrapped inside your flesh and soul. 

but i can wait, patient and with prayer, pleas that He never lets you falter, that He opens you back up to Him, like the light you showed me when we were younger. you're not ever lost, so long as you can blink and be reminded, of favors long shown, upon your being He's showered, since the day of your birth, and the time He let me know you existed. the inabilities of a slave, to affect and preserve his beloved, perhaps one of the most tormenting of states, but submission to his Maker, in reality the only forward path, in this life of winding deja vu's and changes. if you reach for the skies, its Heavens, i promise they'll reach back for you, overwhelming with His blessings, just takes a single step, then another, before Eternity brings you its promise of forever.