PLEASE MAMA, JUST LET ME LOOK AT YOU - The Ramadan Story, Part 5

Keeping Company

May I please sit here with you?

May I please talk to you?

May I please have your unfailing attention?

May I please have your love,

Your mercy and compassion?

May I please have your ear,

And share with you all my joy and pain?

May I please have your time,

In this brief pause between the rain?

In this quiet solitude of the night,

So dark and still without the moonlight, 

While everyone else is asleep,

May I have your company to keep?

Perhaps I don't make friends easy,

Perhaps I am not very companionable, 

So, God please...

While others have given up on me

Please say that you will stay.

........................

The Mirror of Truth. I hope nobody is taking the poem above negatively. Sometimes, I reckon that we have given up on ourselves. "Ugh!" We would cringe when we contemplate ourselves in front of the mirror. Know that you are looking at a lie when you think yourself ugly or a failure. If you could see yourself with the Gaze of Love upon the Mirror of Truth, verily you would prostrate before the reflection. And what exactly is the reflection that you would see then? I am not sure. But if it would impel me to prostrate, it must be quite a sight... masyaAllah.

Remembering Mother. My mum, may God bless her soul, was very companionable. Day and night our house used to be filled with visitors. I miss those hectic busy days now, and would give anything to see her once again. I don't care anymore about her cooking or anything like that at all. What I would tell her right now if I could is, "Please, just sit there and let me look at you..."

A Beautiful Birth. Ten thousand years ago, you and I were not born yet. But all that has happened then, and all that has occurred even further back than that, has led to your birth. Perhaps like me, you have made many mistakes and misused your time here in this world. But nothing that you have done since can unmake you and your beautiful birth. InsyaAllah (God willing), tomorrow is another day to prove this. Surely God the Loving One would not have gone to all this trouble to make Creation and you to humiliate, embarrass or oppress you? How can He when He has forbidden any acts of oppression or unfairness upon His Godly Self? In a Hadith (verbal tradition of the Prophet s.a.w.s.), God assured and commanded us, "O' My servants, I have forbidden oppression for Myself and have made it forbidden amongst you, so do not oppress one another."  

Forgetting to ask God something. I am troubled by an ear infection, which often causes stabs of pain around my ear and my temple. I am sad that this comes with the arrival of Ramadan, but an ancient friend dropped by last evening and said, "You should take this opportunity to plead for all sorts of things from God now instead of simply complaining. Don't you know that God is most attentive to those with illness and in pain?!" I followed his advice and every time I feel that someone is drilling into my head, I would ask something from God. The only problem is I keep forgetting to ask Him to cure me and stop the pain. He he he. 

But then again, if you have such an intimate moment with our Loving Creator, would you ask Him to stop? 

Something to reflect on, sunshine. Have a wonderful day tomorrow.

Sometimes Love, like life, can appear to be a little hard,
But there is no need for all that drama, you know...
Just say BismillahiRahmaniRahim and enter.
(In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful)

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way 

IF YOU HURT, AT LEAST YOU KNOW YOU ARE NOT HEARTLESS! the benefits and advantages of pain and hurt

A mureed was attending the discourses of a mighty Shaykh, a well-known master of the spiritual path of Islam. The Shaykh was not the sort to mince his words, and as he spoke, barbed darts and barbed arrows issued forth from his lips and pierced the conscience of all the mureeds in attendance. Each one felt it, in his or her own way. Ouchie.

One particular mureed actually winced as if hurt by physical pain and the Shaykh noticed. He turned to him and addressed the mureed and by that way he addressed all the mureeds. "Oh foolish one! You winced, did you? You felt the heat of my white words, did you? Well, take that as a good sign from Your Creator, for He has left you now, even after years of your neglect, forgetfulness and sinning, with a heart that could still feel!"  

Hurt Heart

It is better to have feelings,

And with that, the ability to feel hurt,

Than to be heartless

And be known to your God

As someone without feelings.

..............................

And here we are today, sunshine. And I reckon just like me, you still have a heart that Allah (s.w.t.) has bestowed that you might feel and find your way through the maze of this dunya (physical world). Yes, I know... sometimes we stumble and fall, and often enough falling foul of God's commandments. But alhamdulillah (God be praised!), that when we fall we feel the hurt. 

Other wise, how long do you think we would still be falling into the abyss, unknowing of our errors and mistakes?

Greetings of peace and blessings upon the Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w.s.), and His inheritors through whom we may learn a little about who we are. They are like mirrors into our own souls.

Have a lovely Sunday.

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way

THE BEST WAY MIRRORS CAN BE BROKEN - an allergic reaction

Talking to Yourself

You are talking to yourself only,

As you walk and cast your reflection

Upon the mirror that is called the World.

All the good, all the bad,

All the pretty, all the ugly

And all the in between.

Is you.

........................

Allergy. Everyone is helping. My hands don't look very nice presently. It is full of scabs and spots which appear to be caused by an allergy outbreak. The doctor has prescribed antibiotics and antihistamine which didn't really work. I also supplemented that with a Chinese herbal remedy (full of dried roots, barks, fruits and fruit skins of laichee and wintermelons) which I had to boil into a blackish brackish ointment to soak my hands in. It kinda helped to heal the open cuts but didn't really help with the actual allergy, and the spots kept coming out. After a week I went to see the doctor again and he stopped the antibiotics but continued with a stronger antihistamine and a gel to rub on the skin. Finally yesterday, Ani, my loyal clerk, gave me a strange jello made from sea weed. I have rubbed my hands twice, and I think my hands feel a little better. I am also taking probiotic supplement pills, as suggested by Mr. Ikhlas, which also seems to be helping. 

White gloves. Today Heche purchased for me a pair of white cotton gloves. I have to travel with Alex and Ariffin down to Singapore over the weekend for a massive signing appointment with buyers of a new condo development in southern tip of Johor. I would wear the gloves if my hands have not dramatically improved by then. Don't wanna scare the clientele. It is not infectious of course, but you understand...

Breaking the Mirror. To be honest with you, I was a bit frustrated over my allergy.. and my own mirror surrounded my thoughts and amplified my concern. But now I cannot ignore that it is sometimes our own maladies and sickness that brings out the best in people around us. Our family and friends, so curious and concerned with my present condition. And despite what the above prose says, this time I think there is no mirror there at all between me and my fair-wishing friends and kin. They are gentle caring creatures, and they broke through my mirror of frustration to give me hope, and insyaAllah, a cure.

And that is the best way mirrors can be broken. Through compassion.

...try this. It might help.

Don't you agree, sunshine?

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way

Salman and the Best Mirror in all Creation - song and hymn writing in different languages

1. Find a Native Speaker

There is simply no way

For you to write nasyids

And mauluds in another

Language. The best you

Can and ought to do,

Is to find a native speaker

And share a mirror

Together. There is really

No other way to grasp

The nuances and inflection

Of a different nation.

Salman al Farsi knew this,

But he was blessed to find

The Best Mirror of Hijaz

And the Best Mirror of all Creation!

....................

I wish I could understand Arabic, both modern and ancient. Perhaps I shall find time to study, but oh boy, nowadays I am in such a hurry.

Amongst the earlier Grand Shaykhs of the Naqshbandi Order is Salman al Farsi (Salman the Persian), and I am fond of him because he was a non-Arab. When some of the naughtier Companions raised issue that he(Salman) did not belong to any renowned Arab family or clan, the Prophet heard of this and said, "Salman is of my House..."

Thus he was fortunate to find a sympathetic heart, a heart most renowned in kindness, not only in Hijaz, but indeed in all of creation - Muhammad Habibullah(pbuh). Now I am wondering if Salman ever wrote any Arab hymns and songs (nasyid and mawluds) in praise of God and in praise of the Prophet(pbuh)... Or perhaps in his native Persian?

If you know, sunshine... do share with me!

wa min Allah at-taufiq

Hate has no place in Islam

Love will show the Way

Vanity, the Mirror of Your Ego and the Nature of Creation

THE QUEEN. The wicked and vain queen peddles her beauty before the Mirror each day, seeking assurance that bar none, it is she who is the fairest of them all. Until one fateful day, the Mirror ups and tells her that no, she ain't the hottest chick in the hood anymore. The spiritual analogy of the Snow White story is that the mirror was merely reflecting the Queen's own sense of vanity and insecurities. For the root of the vanity tree is insecurity.

THE MIRROR. If you would believe Muslim spiritual lore about the nature of this world, I would not blame you if you come to the conclusion that upon creation, God simply assembled a couple of trillion upon trillion upon trillion times infinity of mirrors and stood them up towards each other. Then He waited for the reflections (aka us) to start looking for Him! But He is not actually there! And we don't actually 'exist' being mere reflections of God's Own Devices. A conversational prose was recorded some time back about this. In the first para, "you" were negated. Then "I" myself was negated, and finally "we" both were negated... leaving only God, the Lord of all Reflections.

90. I alone exists in a world of mirrors

In a world of mirrors

Only I alone exists

And no one else.

Not even you.

And

You alone exists

And no one else.

Not even me.

And

No one exists

Not you,

Not me.

And this is a good analogy of the first part of the Muslim declaration of faith - That there is no god but God.

VANITY. The poor Queen was distraught when she felt that her physical beauty has become only a Runner-Up. But vanity is not just about good looks...

Vanity in the Mirror of Your Ego

Beware, for vanity

Comes in many guises

Before the looking glass…

Your Patience and Chivalry

Your Honour and Humility

Your Charity and Piety…

All become vanity

When you see yourself reflected in

The Mirror of your Ego.

Have a day of beautiful reflections, sunshine. Look with your heart as much as you can, and resist looking into the Mirror of your Ego. It will show you no good at all.

wa min Allah at-taufiq.