Something to think about

A while ago someone posted a picture on facebook about Islamists (or something related to them, I don’t exactly remember) and pasted the famous verse from Surat Al-Kahf

قُلْ هَلْ نُنَبِّئُكُم بِٱلْأَخْسَرِينَ أَعْمَٰلًا

Say (O Muhammad SAW): “Shall We tell you the greatest losers in respect of (their) deeds?

ٱلَّذِينَ ضَلَّ سَعْيُهُمْ فِى ٱلْحَيَوٰةِ ٱلدُّنْيَا وَهُمْ يَحْسَبُونَ أَنَّهُمْ يُحْسِنُونَ صُنْعًا

“Those whose efforts have been wasted in this life while they thought that they were acquiring good by their deeds!

And honestly, I was crept out. I mean, how are you sure that this verse applied to them and not yourself? Isn’t this the lesson learned from it in the first place? To think that maybe you are losing in respect of your deeds that you think are good? It’s supposed to make you doubt your intentions and be extra careful about purifying them.

So what, you’re like perfectly above this verse, and you’re now knowledgeable enough to apply it on others? This is just wrong, man.

Let’s read the rest of the verses ..

أُو۟لَٰٓئِكَ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا۟ بِـَٔايَٰتِ رَبِّهِمْ وَلِقَآئِهِۦ فَحَبِطَتْ أَعْمَٰلُهُمْ فَلَا نُقِيمُ لَهُمْ يَوْمَ ٱلْقِيَٰمَةِ وَزْنًۭا

“They are those who deny the Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, etc.) of their Lord and the Meeting with Him (in the Hereafter). So their works are in vain, and on the Day of Resurrection, We shall not give them any weight.

ذَٰلِكَ جَزَآؤُهُمْ جَهَنَّمُ بِمَا كَفَرُوا۟ وَٱتَّخَذُوٓا۟ ءَايَٰتِى وَرُسُلِى هُزُوًا

“That shall be their recompense, Hell; because they disbelieved and took My Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, etc.) and My Messengers by way of jest and mockery.

This is so not about judging others, it’s not even close. It’s a warning to you, and only you. When you’re all omniscient and angelic, feel free to point fingers, but until them, heed your own intentions, please.

God that’s scary!

Nasheed

For those of you who enjoy a good old Nasheed :)

You can download it here.

أنا إن سألت القوم عني من أنا ؟

أنا مؤمن سأعيش دوما مؤمنا ..
لن أنحني .. لن أنثني .. لن أركنا ..
أنا مسلم .. هل تعرفون المسلما ؟
أنا نور هذا الكون إن هو أظلما ..
أنا في الخليقة ري من يشكو الظما ..
وإن دعى الداعي أنا حامي الحما ..

أنا مصحف يمشي وإسلام يُرى ..
أنا نفحة عُلوية فوق الثرى ..
الكون لي ولخدمتي قد سخرا
ولمن أنا .. أنا للذي خلق الورى ..
ولغيره لن أنحني لن أنثني لن أركنا ..
أنا من جنود الله .. حزب محمد ..
وبغير هدى محمد لا أهتدي

حاشاي أن اُصغي لدعوة ملحدٍ
وأنا فتى القرآن وابن المسجد
أنا كوكب يهدي القوافل في السرى
وأنا الشهاب إذا رأيتُ المنكرا
مالي سوى نفس تعز على الشرا
قد بعتها لله ….. والله اشترى

Ibraheem

Lord of the ‘Alamin ..

Who has created me, and it is He Who guides me;

And it is He Who feeds me and gives me to drink.

And when I am ill, it is He who cures me.

And Who will cause me to die, and then will bring me to life (again);

And Who, I hope will forgive me my faults on the Day of Recompense

My Lord! Bestow Hukman on me, and join me with the righteous;

And grant me an honorable mention in later generations;

And make me one of the inheritors of the Paradise of Delight;

And disgrace me not on the Day when (all the creatures) will be resurrected;

The Day whereon neither wealth nor sons will avail,

Except him who brings to Allah a clean heart …

And Paradise will be brought near to the Muttaqun

And the (Hell) Fire will be placed in full view of the erring ..

This ..

I like the fact that real couples are featured ..

honest and true,

Story – VI

My two feet deep closet was floormatted with a velvety cloth. The things hanged either smelled of flowers, of clean, or simply of me. I quickly cleared a space under his left arm, and we both sat in total silence for a while, with our legs stretching out. I was still in my shoes all this time. He didn’t say anything, he was just breathing. My head, now a shy child in the hug of his arm and chest, in its dedicated favorite warm place, was entranced by the music of his heartbeat. It changes rhythm; its quick throbbing after he broke my light fall segued now into a poised old man gait. Every moment in a while, he inhales a depth, and the rhythm goes stronger I can sense the thuds against my right cheek.

His face leans over my head. “What are we doing?”, he whispers.

“What happened to you?”, I ask, my eyes closed.

He sighs and I get lost again by his chest. The hail dwindled into a drizzle, and droplets thrown into formed puddles echo outside a sound so beautiful.

“I was hit by the frantic truck that’s fate”, he starts. My eyes are half opened by the infinitesimal shift in the way his heart walks.

“Ever tried to dare fate, Onna? It usually happens when some of us try to change into people they aren’t. You can call it overconfidence. Yes, I might have been too confident”, he trails off.

“Confident about what?”

“About what I thought I wanted out of life. I strode too fast and then I hit a cliff and stopped too late”

“Ibraheem”

“Yes”

“Mesh fahma”

He smiles, even though I don’t see his face. I think I’m getting the hang of his heart’s language, it’s astonishingly expressive. It never lies and best part is, he can’t control that.

“If there’s anything I wish to say about it, Noha, it’ll be very similar to what this boy would think; the boy who didn’t listen to the warnings his mother had given him before he fled to the street late at night to play with the rest of the cretins.

“They started a fire from scattered wooden remains. They knew how to, but he didn’t. He thought he did and he so blindly followed his sorrowful conviction; he even heroically decided to make an example, to break more rules, to go the forbidden extra mile and to polish himself before his awed friends, when he .. so courageously .. jumped right into the god damn fire.”

He struggled a pause.

“They all fled the scene. They were right to do so. He was burnt there for some minutes before he could realize the pain, late enough for his injuries to be at their absolute worst. He stumbled back home, treading on his own blood; tears streaked his existence and regret .. tore it apart into fleeting shadows.”

He swallowed a cry so silent it sunk my heart.

“His mother hugged him, even though she scorned him. But he lost his senses, he lingered there in her breast trying to feel the warmth, trying so hard to find comfort; but he was in too much pain to feel any.”

His hand pressed against my left arm, and his cheeks hugged my head. My whole weight shifted towards him.

“And even as he healed, Noha, even as he healed, that memory never stopped haunting him; the image of that fire and how so confident was he striding towards his own doom never really left him to enjoy hearing the echoes of his laughs.

If they even echoed ..”

His voice dragged in lurches, the tone of him limped at moments, and his heart screamed details. A flinch started from the utter great deep of him; he fought with it and it defeated him; it left him strewn in pieces before it spreaded into his body, and I felt its ripple in mine. It was the strangest encounter. It’s as if a wound ruptured! He was breathless and his agony was thinly voiceless.

My face moved in its cradle and my lips landed on his beard. His heart woke up in surprise, it gushed; he was restless. I didn’t budge. I stayed in my kiss, I believed in it. He stiffened, and then he let go. He exhaled a cloud of worries and sorrow. It’s as if I could see it. His body was suddenly lighter, and his heart fluttered in pace, before it slowed down, and down, and down. He giggled, and thanked me.

I love that bastard.

Untitled, again.

Isn’t it amazing how very related guilt and heartbeat are?

You know, there’s not a suffering that measures up to the one experienced by an eastern man who goes western every once in a while. Choices are either so freaking thin, or they’re too confusingly wide.

He couldn’t wait for the day his mother would show him the photograph of the girl he was to marry, a charming girl, he hoped, with cheeks like two Simla apples, who hadn’t allowed her mind to traverse the gutters and gray areas, and he would adore her for the miracle she was.

Sai was not miraculous; she was an uninspiring person, a reflection of all the contradictions around her, a mirror that showed him himself far too clearly for comfort.

_ Kiran Desai

I remember a good friend once telling me not to think on behalf of others; not to decide something for them, because it’ll be unfair for both of us. But I can’t help but do that really, I read people too well, and even though I might be mistaken, there’s always a trace that proves that my judgment was correct, and I can’t live with that trace. For me things are too black and white. I just can’t accept gray, it’s how I’m built; one can’t easily change that.

I obsess, and the more I do the harder it becomes for nature to assume its course at nurturing innocent acquaintances. I take note of little details, and I think of things no one really cares about. I don’t like disappointing people, and I’m too harsh on them just as I’m too harsh on myself. To top all of that, my kindness misleads me; my idea of fancy gestures clouds my true intentions, and although I like to be known for who I really am, it alarms me and it just nudges my comfort. It’s like, I just have to keep an outer shell, just in case.

Believe me, the question Desai above was trying to answer for the guy is universal. Men are perplexed by their own instinct for hunt, and their own craving for a home. They’re completely opposite things; and we men fall for one and mistake it for the other. You don’t hunt something that you can live with, you idiot.

You can’t have a challenge for a lifetime, it’ll drain you out. You’ll be dead before you even know it. Someone you go all those miles for, someone you change your own skin for, someone you take pride in having managed to impress; is most probably someone you don’t live with. People you can live with are ones who complete your sentences, ones who are too comforting, ones who don’t really urge you to fall off cliffs for them, rather cheer you on by their mere presence; ones who you can exercise silence with, free and unguarded silence.

Alas, just as it is with all people who have to make mistakes so that they really get to know them, this is like this. You actually have to go all the way and hit the very wall everyone knows about, get your butt all the way back, admit you were wrong, and then go for the she who you never thought would be the one in the first place.

Or did you?

—

I remember your smile. I have spent ages trying to decipher the wrinkle on one side, and the anticipation painted in the other. I have spent entire lifetimes attempting to know how much did it really take of you to actually smile, while you knew, as well as I did, that you were to pass away. Am I going to be special, I ask myself. Are wonders waiting for me, I fantasize. Did she see a vision, the future? I apostrophe.

Why were you smiling, Mom? I’m dying to know.

real fiction ..

You know how sometimes people can so fit in cartoon characters? the tone, the lisp sometimes, the funny stature when they express their worries, or their happiness? the way they suddenly run, jump, scream or laughingly weep? Those people, you can’t fix a stern face with them; your anger always fails miserably at delivering its message when they’re the subject. They just stretch your face in a smile; a smile you will not be able to hold back.

My sister is one of those people. Yesterday in her pink, cushiony dress, she was in my hug. She muttered some words in childish monotone that I couldn’t fathom, but that was all her. She was happily engaged to a good man, yesterday, she was. Alhamdulilah.

I’m taming my untrained words now in an attempt to describe my weird feelings. It’s like, something is done. A burden has been cast off me and dad’s chests, in a sort. With that seeps in me the realization that it was all so natural, so planned of life for her to meet her match now. I like watching this universe directed by its creator, delivering to those who wait that which they deserve. It’s so beautiful how patience always pays you back one day what it kept taking away from you.

Why are we all always in a hurry? What’s so amazing about the end that we’re all so keen on running for? Didn’t we all experience ends before? How many times have we found out the mundane a moment turned out, that was once so sought. Lemme recollect that Mitch Albom quote, I don’t remember where the book is. Wait, I think someone borrowed it, and we both forgot. Hmm ..

*goes to google*

Okay, the page is so slow now. Anyway ..

So .. I mean .. I really think it’s all about our expectations. It’s the darnest thing if you ask me, that expectations stuff. You wait and anticipate and build up all those false images and then when it all finally happens, it passes by so normally. So fireworkless, no excitement, no long pauses like the ones that once filled all of your daydreams. Just, life. With its unceasing gait, with its .. unwaiting state ..

Quote is up..

All that happens when your dreams come true is a slow, melting realization that it wasn’t what you thought. – Mitch

Well, for me, even though depressing at first taste, the fact is, it’s very comforting. Fireworks are good when, you know, you watch them a night or two a year, not when they’re always there! I mean, it’d be so noisy and annoying!

We’re tricked into thinking that beautiful pauses in life should stretch. It’s not their purpose to do that, instead, they only exist for making us happy every once in a while. We shouldn’t expect more than that of them. They’re like kisses: they are one-second happenings, and lifetime memories.

On the other hand, what should last forever, what truly should have steadiness and everlasting flare, are people; down to earth, imperfect people. Ones who you’ll fight with every now and then, but ones whom the idea of going home with doesn’t irk, doesn’t agitate, doesn’t make you second guess your judgments. People whom you live with. Family.

And the equation of it – life, true life, is, umm, when one of them lovely moments come with those people who’re always around. It’s rare but my God, there’s nothing more beautiful in the world than this. For your Mom, who you see everyday, to give you a hug that you remember for decades. For your dad, who wakes you up every morning,  to one time kiss your forehead into eternal remembrance. For your sister to laugh an echo in your heart. For your brother to come and caress your hair into numbing warmth ..

For your love, to sleep in your arms one night, unplanned, unintended, except by destiny. To find things you didn’t even know you were searching for. To realize things that just make you happy. To live life in deja vu, with all of its incomplete excitement.

Imperfection is more perfect with the right ones, indeed.

I love Ghada.

So very freaking much ..

—

My two feet deep closet was floormatted with a velvety cloth. The things hanged either smelled of flowers, of clean, or simply of me. I quickly cleared a space under his left arm, and we both sat in total silence for a while, with our legs stretching out. I was still in my shoes all this time. He didn’t say anything, he was just breathing. My head, now a shy child in the hug of his arm and chest, in its dedicated favorite warm place, was entranced by the music of his heartbeat. It changes rhythm; its quick throbbing after he broke my light fall segued now into a poised old man gait. Every moment in a while, he inhales a depth, and the rhythm goes stronger I can sense the thuds against my right cheek.

His face leans over my head. “What are we doing?”, he whispers.

“What happened to you?”, I ask, my eyes closed.

Might be continued ..