THE WALL………….

July………….it is for me what December is for brother Anis.
It will be four years this July 13 when the cops came to our house to tell me that Tariq was “deceased”.
As I enter the last days of June, I can hear the anger of the ocean of grief rising with every passing moment. The tumultuous waters I cannot see, nor feel as there is a wall between me and them.

A wall created by the Dhikr and remembrance of Allah. I do not know when it went up, but when ever I hear the rising anger of the wild ocean of grief, I feel the wall separating me, protecting me from the raging waters, from being lost in them forever………my wall……. made to protect me from drowning in the ocean of grief…….made by Him Subhanawataala,

All I can think as I hear the angry lap of the waves of grief on the other side of the wall and feel their aggressive anger is:

“Then which of the favors of your Lord will ye deny?”   055.028

He protects me from the tidal wave gaining strength on the other side of the wall……….it is July again and as the waves of the sea of grief gain strength and crash against the wall …….it stands sentinel, strong and witness to all the grief as it protects me from its thunder.

I have to remind myself to thank Him Subhanawataala for protecting me and say:
002.156 YUSUFALI: Who say, when afflicted with calamity: “To Allah We belong, and to Him is our return”

I CAN’T BELIEVE IT I AM GOING BACK……..

I am going back…………..I can’t believe I am going back. I don’t even want to analyze why there is a spring in my heart. I am going back to innocence, unsullied by the crowds, in the bazaar, untouched by time.

I am going back, to lay my head down on the cool marble, walk till the tiles narrow telling me that I have completed my circle. My heart facing His house, I walk, slow, I walk fast, the timelessness in the circle only interrupted by the adhaan, calling the tawafees to prayer…………..

This is a package deal, thus I am going back to the storyteller, who comes each evening after the maghrib prayer and weaves a web of unreality and you find yourself drawn into it, bit by bit sipping the sweet mint tea, knowing from some remote part of your brain that this will soon be lost, some first world country will bomb it and blow all history to smithereens…………and with another sip of the mint tea you lay down your fears and submit………….

Submit to Him around whose House I am circambulating, has he admitted me in? Not yet I know, there is a lot to be cleansed around my heart, and with every circle a little more crud falls off my heart.

I am walking the uneven cobbled streets………….I am back, the history of the street pulls at me, the innocence of it roots me there, I am free, I am safe, I am protected and I am loved, how strange………..a foreign city where I only know few souls, and yet I feel I have been here and I want to belong here.

I am going back and entering the coolness of the Roza, there is no peace here. Women are wrestling to pray on the carpet that signifies the Riaz al Jannah………how we women sometimes take things literally: RasoolAllah pbuh has said, and I paraphrase: the space between my home and my minbar is a piece of jannah………..what did he mean? I and a million other women take it literally, we find ourselves feverishly wrestling for our little spot in Riaz al Jannah………

I rationalize to my self that he pbuh meant that He or she who prays behind me or where I prayed will get a piece of the action in Jannah.

No matter what rationalization I put on these words of RasoolAllah pbuh, they flee my mind as my steps hurry towards the Roza, seeking the piece of earth between his house and His minbar to pray.

I dive into the sea of women, some 7 ft tall from Somalia some 4 feet tall from India and then women of all manner and sizes in between are like an ocean of bodies wrestling for a small rectangle.

I often think in retrospect that it truly represents us in the Akirah where we will be struggling to get our book of deeds in our right hand………..and no one will care about another……….I am pulled to the spot like a magnet, and despite all the rationalization and that I should be acting with Rasool Allah’s Ikhlaaq, it draws me with a gnawing desire to in some way find a shortcut to jannah and propels me into this crowd of bodies.

Swimming feverishly trying to make my two rakats of succor for my ticket to jannah.  I find myself moving forward with a determination unparrelleled to anything I have ever done before, towards the rectangle between his house and his minbar with the sole purpose of making two rakat on it………and nothing can stop me at that time.

I am walking the streets, of the souk and one turn and I enter the domed building where Saladin lies buried and I pause, how often and with what anguish Muslims have called upon Allah Subhanawataala to send us a Saladin, a Saladin that will wrest Jerusalem from the killing fields and with his generous spirit of Ehsaan seed the olive trees that have been wrenched out of the ground by caterpillar tractors and rejuvenate the spirit of justice, mercy and ehsaan.

………And yet as I see his grave covered with a green cloth with the verse of the throne written on it, I wonder, even he with all his glory and magnificence lies in the same amount of space that I would take to lie in. He an amazing person and a brave warrior, and I just Jane Doe.

I am going back………….. What will I do there I do not know yet…………but it really does not matter for I feel the music start in my soul and my spirit is on its journey upwards and towards His House………..

I am on the caravan from Shaam to Mecca, like all the pilgrims in history.

WHY ARE HOLIDAYS TOUGH?

It is Thanksgiving and the turkey is ready. We are all home and we have added another family member to- be to our little family. Shireen’s fiancée is now adapting to us and we to him.

As the carving time comes, there is no banter to be had between brother and sister and no friendly teasing while the wishing bone is tugged on by the sibs. The photograph of thanksgiving is taken to remember another year together and the empty spot next to Shireen is poignantly evident.

So why are the holidays tough, don’t we remember Tariq every day? Or is it just on the holidays?

Everyday his memory is a personal remembrance of what he and I shared a connection that I personally had with him that I miss.

At the holidays whether it be Thanksgiving or Shireen’s white coat ceremony it seems the loss becomes compounded and public. It almost reflects off of the people present and the void next to them is pronounced, the missing piece in our life is even more apparent.

We cannot replace Tariq nor Shireen, whether they are absent from life or from circumstance. We miss them; they each have their own particular characteristics that they bring to the holidays that make the time together fun, and at times amusing, but always memorable.

So why are the holidays tough? We still have Shireen and she still has us and now she also has her fiancée. It is difficult to assess. Why when we get together as a family on a happy or sad occasion that we miss the person who is absent.

Eid is here, I remember putting Tariq on the airport shuttle on his way back to college after his last Eid with us. It was cold and he was reluctant to go as I was to let him. There was a feeling of finality; I mistook it to be his return to college and a separation of parent and child as we move on and away into different life spheres.

So why do we miss him and my mother so much at the holidays?

My mother……..I celebrated so many Eids with her, actually I can think of very few when she was not with me either as a child or a grown up married women. I remember the gusto and affectionate detail with which she would buy her cards for each holiday for each child and grandchild and secretly one for me………..I miss the words she chose so carefully for each card such that they seemed to be written by her and coming from her heart and so why do I miss her on the holiday.

The preparations for Eid were always a joint project, first the plans for the day, then shopping for gifts both for her grand kids and her sons and their spouses, then the painstaking process of wrapping them and taking them to the post office. As long as she drove, she did all that seamlessly, it is only when she could no longer drive did I realize the hours she put into the care of choosing a gift and card and gift for each child and grandchild and their respective spouses, preparing them for mail and then sending them off in a timely manner.

With Eid came the discussion for the Eid menu with her and the décor, I was good at the later and she would make her famous “saviyou ka zarda’ unmatched to this day.

I would make sure the table was set for a formal brunch for the family to be partaken after prayers. She would admire and appreciate my artistry and sometimes even laugh affectionately at my inordinate attention to ambience.

No matter what happened we had our formal brunch with the immediate family followed by the children wishing a formal Eid Mubarak to her with salaam, their hands itching for the Eidee that they knew was on its way from her to them.

As they got older they became more sheepish at continuing to accept cash for Eidee from her knowing that she was on a restrictive income.

She and I and the kids would then go out for putt putt or to visit others or do something the children wanted………we did this year after year, and so this became the fabric of our lives.

………And this is the reason holidays are tough, because I can see the rents and holes in the fabric of our lives and I feel the cold air of loneliness coming through these holes.

As I listen to Surah Al Anfal I realize that the kith and kin of the tribes of Arabia were realigned with the Battle of Badr. Friendships of faith sprung up side by side where blood relatives became blood thirsty, all in one defining moment. This gave me pause and has allowed me to reflect on why I miss my kin on the holidays, and perhaps do some redefining and realigning.

This year there was no one at home to celebrate Eid ul Adha with me. Each family member had a reason for their absence. I decided that this was the time to regenerate my family and reach out to my sisters in Islam and make them a part of my life, share what I could, with them, meager and simple as it may be, with genuine hospitality and love giving what is most precious to me ………….Time!

They came and along with them came a sister for whom this was her first Eid. She has been a Muslim for only a year, and as the afternoon unraveled we sat over glasses of wassail and tea and bowls of soup and listened to her journey to Islam. She traveled to the path of Deen via the west coast, Afghanistan, and Iraq and then finally reaching the south, she found the answer to her search for truth.

Her saga for the search for the genuine Deen was riveting: how her heart was always guiding her toward Allah Subhanawataala. How at every curve that her life took, she was placed on the path facing Islam and as she put it beautifully while we sat in pin drop silence listening to her life story “Jesus took me by the hand and placed me before Allah as the one God”

And thus I had a family this Eid at home, not one that you would think of in terms of tradition, but a family nevertheless, each member of which was kind, graceful and caring in their own unique manner in the sharing of their love. Thus this Eid……… though the holes still remain in the fabric of my life but the air that comes through those holes this holiday is fragrant with the perfume of friendship and love fi sabillallah. (For the sake of Allah).

Holidays are tough………. but there are friends of Deen waiting out there to send the fragrance of friendship to us fi sabillallah, if we show an inclination to invite them in as our family and accept the fabric of our lives as is, with holes and all……….

Are Holidays tough for you? What do you do to help yourself?

carnation photo: courtesy of www. flickr.com :eidcards

THE COLOR OF MY MEMORIES……….

I am sitting quietly and watching the painters cover up fifteen years of my memories, one by one with each stroke of the paint brush life as it was becomes remote and unrecoverable.

We are painting after fifteen years and replacing the carpet after twenty three years. we had moved into this house shortly after Tariq was born.

My mind is running a marathon, but I am hitting a wall, where I am unable to think and feel anymore, I decide to check out the people who are carpeting the rooms, and there in begins a new journey of the closets.

I am amazed how one bedroom can fill just the contents of one closet. I open Shireen s closet it is empty she has already stashed the important stuff out of sight, deep in the recesses of her room.

I walk through the connecting bathroom that the children have shared growing up and stand in Tariq’s newly carpeted room, he would have enjoyed the clean look. His tux and his sadris remind me that he is not there to use them.  I want someone to use them and yet it seems callous to throw them in the faceless pile going to Goodwill.

I turn away and spot his signature hat lying on the floor of the closet. My heart is not full, nor are my eyes brimming with tears at its sight just a regret…………of circumstances that made him unhappy sometimes by those very close ones…I decide to shut that door mentally. Regret and “if” opens the door to Shaytaans’s whisperings and waswasas, according to our Prophet Muhammad PBUH.

I walk back to Shireen’s room, where Tariq’ s things have been stashed, for now. His awards are spilling out of a box and his hockey from Pakistan and tennis racket are symbols of good times and travels gone by.
He has not taken anything with him, he does not need anything where he is except our duas, and yet…………..I find it hard to let go of these last vestiges of material memories.

I am on this journey alone; Paul and Shireen have disappeared, partly due to circumstance and some due to choice.

Avoidance is the style of some to deal with grief. I find that avoidance just allows the grief to steal into my heart and mind stealthily and surprise me, paralyzing me into inaction.

Thus I continue to journey alone…….. In his drawer is an album, a step-by-step illustration of the process of restoring his love.

He spent one year lovingly restoring an old 68 Camaro, working every weekend at the car garage, loving every moment of it……..and now it stands in our garage untouched and veiled in sorrow.

Material things…..I must learn to detach the memories from material things, these things don’t represent Tariq, nor does a diamond ring represent love……and yet I hesitate, and feel helpless as the colors of my memories fade and are  replaced one by one…….. by others.

HAROON…………the gentle one

I am listening to the tafseer of Surah Al Araaf by Farhat Hashmi. She comes to the part where Moses (AS) is called by Allah SWT to give him the message, and as he gets ready to leave he asks his brother Haroon to take care of the Children of Israel when he is gone.

She then describes the temperament of Haroon (AS)………..born in the same household as Moses (AS) older brother to him, and yet unlike him, he is soft spoken, gentle and non confrontational.

My mind goes to another Haroon………soft spoken, gentle and non-confrontational. Born in a pack of five brothers and one sister some older than him some younger.

Old colonial home in Amritsar,check the rooftop contiguity

He at age one hunkering down in the darkened rooms of his grandparents home in Amritsar at night in a blackout that is only brightened by the torches of the Hindu rioters near my grandmother’s house.

My grandmother lived at the border of the Hindu section in a large sprawling bungalow that connected in the city with other homes through the closeness of their roof tops, My grandfather was the physician at the Hospital nearby treating Hindu’s and Muslims equally during the riot of Partition between Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan.

Neither my grandmother nor my grandfather ever thought of leaving their ancestral home in the Punjab ever. My father, who had gone to Pakistan to set up a Hospital, had left my mother and her three boys and one on the way with her parents in a safe, affluent neighborhood close to the hospital.

I can hear my mother relating “the night” Here is what I remember of what she said:

“As the evening shadows would lengthen the house would be plunged in complete blackout to deter the rioters from discerning who if anybody lived there. After many days of siege of the Muslim quarter, my father was stranded in the hospital and could not return home because of the mobs at the gates of the muslim quarter.
Our fresh food was slowly running out, the first item of need was milk for Haroon.

As darkness would fall, my mother would rant and rave and send baduas to each member of the Hindu mob, and then would send her son to run across the rooftops and bring some milk in a lota. He being twelve, a lota was all he could carry while running over the roof tops, dodging bullets and trying to avoid being seen.

Haroon………..would cry when the shots rang out, but his crying also was quiet sobbing, he would never raise his voice as if he knew of the pre eminent danger they were in.”

Haroon my brother never cried aloud as far as I can remember. I recall the wordless tears in his eyes at age nine when he went to Boarding School in Murree, wordless tears in his eyes when my father died. I thank God he never witnessed my mothers or my sons death.

His smiles were also gentle; his laugh hearty but never raucous ……………..Haroon how aptly named was he.

Haroon arriving in Pakistan around one and one half year of age and living with our parents in an apartment in Lady Wellington Hospital where my father worked after partition.

My mother was physically and emotionally stretched as the hospital was mostly filled with the carnage that was carried out on the trains to Pakistan which arrived with people dismembered and severely injured.

Muslim refugees on the train to Pakistan

Her mother and sister had been recruited to nurse the injured while my grandfather & father did surgery. Meanwhile my mother was taking care of her three children and her newborn baby. Haroon became a favorite of a half blind, very affectionate elderly woman from our family called “Mami Muradi” who had sought sanctuary with my parents after all her family was killed in Partition.

I see his photo; he is clinging to Mami Muradi’s legs and looking at the camera from behind the folds of her shalwar, his signature lock of dark hair on his forehead, his intelligent eyes assessing you before he accepts your presence in his life.

Haroon with the gentle hands that eased headaches without medicine, Haroon with the sharp wit and sarcasm that could reduce egos to a heap of sand

Haroon absorbing the pain and disappointments of life without batting an eyelash, Haroon writing a story of a father and a son………..Haroon breaking the academic records in all the commonwealth countries, Haroon spoiling his daughters with joy. Haroon working in Borders in the States.  and saying he enjoys it while in his heart he was homesick for Pakistan.

Haroon absorbing the pain of life till he could absorb no more and his heart exploding with it, spilling out all the anguish, releasing him forever from the ungentleness of this world……………

“Inna lil lahi wa inna elayhe rajaeown”. May his soul rest in peace and May Allah Subhanawataala give him Maghfirah, and guide his daughters and his siblings to the path of Allah Subhanawataala.

May his daughters pray for him everyday in every prayer, for his solace and Maghfirah in the Hereafter!

On being asked once why he spoils his daughters so much he said “they are all I have!”………….and now their prayers are all he has left in this world.

WHO IS MY FRIEND? 7:196

In the throes of loneliness, of loss, of sadness, of the empty chair, of the fading colors of my memories, of the breeze without a fragrance, of the emptiness of my arms, of no one to love me and be a friend and reassure me of the light at the end of the tunnel……….I come to this verse and stop:

Surah Al Araaf 7:196

إِنَّ وَلِـىَ ٱللَّهُ ٱلَّذِى نَزَّلَ ٱكِتَـبَ وَهُوَ يَتَوَلَّى ٱلصَّـلِحِينَ

Lo! my Protecting Friend is Allah Who revealeth the Scripture. He befriendeth the righteous. (7:196)

The contingency: It is the last sentence that I have to struggle for, to be awarded the first.

Have you been awarded His (Subhanawataala) protecting Friendship?

THE EMPTY CHAIR….

the empty chair

I look over the banister and I see the sun streaming in through the window onto the chair……….the empty chair.

I am thinking back a few years……….
She is still alive, and not even very sick. Tehmina has come to visit. Her shiny straight hair swinging around her shoulders, carrying a little spiky plant in her hands.

Tehmina’s parents have always been one of my mother’s favorites. She greets Tehmina with a polite hug, never over effusive and yet not distant. Just her characteristic mix of affection and reserve.

Tehmina sits down and I hear the murmur of their talk while I fix something for them in the kitchen. Soon it is time for Tehmina to leave and they bid goodbye. My mother an old woman, Tehmina a young woman….what is the bond?

Every morning Ammi would sit in the chair, the morning sun streaming on to her and she would read the paper, beside her the little spiky plant would be silently growing, undemanding of attention or much water.

The chair is still there as is the plant but my mother is dead gone beyond my reach and Tehmina has moved away and is now an electronic icon that I talk to off and on.

The scene of Tehmina’s visit is like the opening of the camera shutter, and showing me a glimpse of the love, affection, respect and caring which brought the two together.

That brief moment imprinting the wavelengths of that time and space with the memory of all the emotions that brought Tehmina to visit Ammi and Ammi’s contained joy at her visit.

Jannah lies at the feet of the mother……….how often I thought of that statement as I saw the spa lady perform a pedicure on Ammi after she became unable to do it herself and resisted the invasion of her privacy by almost everyone.

It was only through the coercion of her hairdresser and friend of twenty years that she agreed to the pedicure by her colleague. Who got the jannah, I wonder?

How often we buy baubles for our loved ones thinking that they are an exchange of the time we spent with them. How often a mother says to her busy daughter: when you have some time I want to read to you what I have written of our family history……..and the daughter says “sure ……soon” and is swallowed in the mundane errands of everyday life, until one memorable mother’s day at the lake.

When you are with your parents and they become weak and can no longer look you in the eye with the old ferociousness and fearlessness, you want to deny that they are no longer the powerful, beautiful parents you once had . The ones you looked up to.

However every time you glance at them, in your minds eye they are still the same powerful parent you remember from your youth.

Perhaps it is this very fact that endeared Tehmina to my mother and me. Tehmina did not see an old woman in the chair but the vivacious youthful intelligent energetic woman that I saw. It was perhaps viewing my mother through this lens that prompted her desire for a visit……..I don’t know, yet in some incomprehensible manner there was a bond between the two, unspoken and yet strong.

Age and helplessness in a parent is something that nothing in life prepares you for. Yet if one would have read the Quran many many times with translation as my youngest brother has, you are reminded that old age reverses time:

036.068 
YUSUFALI: If We grant long life to any, We cause him to be reversed in nature: Will they not then understand?

And then what to do as the child of an aging parent?
Allah SWT in the Quran instructs children in the Ten Commandments in Surah Al Anaam how to behave with parents:

6:151 Say: “Come, I will rehearse what Allah hath (really) prohibited you from”: Join not anything as equal with Him; be good to your parents; kill not your children on a plea of want;- We provide sustenance for you and for them;- come not nigh to shameful deeds. Whether open or secret; take not life, which Allah hath made sacred, except by way of justice and law: thus doth He command you, that ye may learn wisdom.

My greatest regret is that I spent a lot of time trying to reform my mother to bring her happiness and relieve her many sadnesses.

I in my enthusiasm to bring her joy thought that if she went out more, met people, read more, wrote more etc etc etc she would be happier.

Perhaps I was thinking what would make me happier would also make her happier. The ironic thing in all this was that when I was at my busiest she had the most time, and when I was the least busy she had no free time.

Eventually I realized that all she wanted was down time with me. Leading the multifaceted life that I led, I did not know what down time was.

From the moment I completed my medical school examination and walked out of the examination hall I had started work and since then Alhamdollillah, I have worked in continuum with very brief breaks. Down time in my book at that time was something you had to feel guilty about.

What have I learnt from this slow and prolonged crisis in my life is that one must have read, re read and reflected on the Quran enough times that when a situation arises of which you have no experience, you can retrieve the information from the Quran in the context that you have already read reflected and understood.

Googling the Quran for a subject, text or word, just does not give us the comprehensive information on which we can act.

It is only when I listen, read and reflect a little bit everyday that when a crisis arises. I can fall back on the words of the Quran that have been stored in the computer of my brain and are accessed based on what is happening.

The large gaps of what I have yet to read, understand and reflect on in the Quran, still need to be filled.

Supplication: May Allah SWT fill my life and my death with the light of the Quran. Ameen.

LOVE & THE LAST COLLECTION

It is one of those long hot timeless afternoons when you look at the verdant surroundings and wonder what the gardens of jannah will be like? You feel the oppressive heat and pray that you never have to ever be close to the Heat of Hell.
The lethargy of the brain and the exhaustion of emotions allow me to think of the Swat weekend as a movie in slow motion and appreciate and relive those moments of love.

It is true that all one needs is a little bit of love. But the most ambitious want is the desire for the Love of Allah (SWT). He gives out His (SWT) love in many different ways and sometimes through many different people, and almost never from the standard sources that you would most expect it from.

It is when I compartmentalize where, how and what kind of love should come from whom, where and how that disappointments occur. My mother would call these “expectations of affection” She strongly discouraged having expectations from others to return your love.

Her concept of having no expectations from your loved ones was quite foreign to me. In all the education I had received (mostly western thought) there is this give and take of affection, need and want and measured reciprocation.

So it had always perplexed me as how does one give affection in a particular relationship without expecting it back? What I did not know was that she was teaching me the very essence of Islam, which is giving “Fi SabeelAllah” giving for the sake of Allah without asking for reciprocation from the individual to whom it is given.

I realize now that giving affection with an expectation of receiving it back is like giving a gift in the hope of getting it returned to you perhaps even manifold

Generosity of material goods is quite easy except for the exceptionally stingy. It is when one gives of ones time, ones love and affection without fear of hurt or reciprocation that one unveils the inside of ones heart and makes it transparent to the recipient.

This act of giving of love is usually followed by fear, as the giver and the thoughtless receiver may consider an unveiled transparent heart, which hides nothing, vulnerable to the strike of hurt.

In the give and take of love in contemporary times, what has almost never been placed in the equation is the power of Allah in this exchange.

After studying some of Imam Ghazali’s work on Love of Allah and The Purification of the Heart by Sheikh Magroubi, I understand that if one gives of ones love fi sabeelallah than the love one receives back is from Allah which may be now in this world via his creation, or later through Him (SWT) directly.

When I accept that Allah SWT is in the equation, being transparent with my love becomes easy and without strings attached.

When someone is mean, I must look at my actions for any source of disobedience of Allah for it may be the reason the landscape around me has changed.

The best treatment when things do not go our way in the reciprocation of emotion or otherwise despite an honest effort on our part is Istighfaar.
In reviewing our actions of the day or the week we may obviously find our specific disobedience to Allah SWT or we may not.

The Prophet (PBUH) who was unsullied by such base behavior would do Istighfaar more than seventy times a day. When asked why some one of his purity of stature would need to do Istighfaar he said and I paraphrase…….Do I not want to enter in Jannah to be with my Lord?

A Pearl from RasullAllah (PBUH):
اللَّهُمَّ إنَّكَ تَسمَعُ كَلامِي، و تَرَى مَكَانِي، و تَعْلَمُ سِرِّي و عَلانِيَتي، و لا يَخفَى عَلَيكَ شَيءٌ مِن أَمرِي، و أَنَا البَائِسُ الفَقِير، ﺍﻟﻤُﺴﺘَﻐِﻴﺚُ المُسْتَجِيرُ، والوَجِلُ المُشفِقُ المُقِرُ المُعتََرِفُ إِلَيكَ بِذَنبِهِ، أسأَلُكَ مَسأَلَةَ المِسكِين، وأَبْتَهِلُ إلَيكَ اِبْتِهَالِ المُذْنِبِ الذَلِيل، و أَدْعُوكَ دُعآءَ الخَائِفُ الضَرِيرُ، دُعآءَ مَنْ خَضَعَتْ لَكَ رَقَبَتُهُ، و فَاضَتْ لَكَ عَبْرَتُهُ، و ذَلَّ لَكَ جِسْمُهُ، و رَغَمَ لَكَ أَنْفُهُ. اللَّهُمَّ لا تَجْعَلنِي بِدُعَائِكَ شَقِياً، و كُنْ بِيَ رَؤُوفَاً، يَا خَيرَ المَسْؤُولِينَ، و خَيرَ المُعْطِينَ.

“Allaahumma innaka tasma‘u kalaamee, wa taraa makaanee, wa ta‘lamu sirree wa ‘alaaniyatee, wa laa yakhfaa ‘alayka shay’un min ’amree, wa ’anal-baa’isu al-faqeer, wal-mustaagheethu al-mustajeer, wal-wajilu al-mushfiqu al-muqiru al-mu‘tarifu ilayka bi-dhambih. As’aluka mas’alata al-miskeen, wa’abtahilu ilayka ibtihaal al-mudhnibi idh-dhaleel, wa ad‘ooka du‘aa’ al-khaa’ifu ad-dareer, du‘aa’a man khada‘at laka raqabatuhu, wa dhalla laka jismuhu, wa raghama laka anfuh. Allaahumma laa taj‘alnee bidu‘aa’ika shaqeeyaa, wa kun beeya ra’oofaa, ya khairal-mas’ooleen, wa khairal-mu‘teen.”

“Ô Allaah, You hear my words, and You see my place. You know my secret and manifest. Nothing of me is hidden from You. I am the miserable, poor one appealing for protection. I am the frightened, pitiful one acknowledging and confessing to You his sins.

I beg You the begging of a needy one and I implore you the imploring of a humiliated sinful one. And I pray to you the prayer of the ailing fearful one; a prayer of one whose neck has bowed to You, whose tears of pain have flooded his eyes, whose body has in servitude humbled itself to you and whose pride has been lowered to the ground for you.

Ô Allaah, let not my share in Your prayer be misery, and be compassionate to me, Ô Most-Responsive of those who are asked, and Ô Most-Giving of those who give.”

Personally when the fear of being hurt by a power other than Allah arises in my heart I remind myself of this supplication:

اللّهُـمَّ لا مانِعَ لِما أَعْطَـيْت، وَلا مُعْطِـيَ لِما مَنَـعْت، وَلا يَنْفَـعُ ذا الجَـدِّ مِنْـكَ الجَـد .
“Allaahumma laa maani‘a limaa a‘tayt, wa laa mu‘tiya limaa mana‘t. Wa laa yanfa‘u dhal-jaddi minkal-jadd.”

“Ô Allaah, none can prevent what You have willed to bestow. And none can bestow what You have willed to prevent. And no wealth or majesty can benefit anyone, as from You is all wealth and majesty.”

Going back to Love by the Grace of Allah:
We are at a small college up north where Tariq spent barely a year, the friendships forged in that time have transferred to us as his family, the love of his friends is now showered upon us. I continuously thank Allah SWT that He placed in the hearts of these young people, Tariqs friends, such compassion, love and transparency, so as to envelope us in the clarity of their affection.

It is evening and we are at the coffee shop and meet G who was Tariq’s colleague in the school paper, She tells me that it is “Tariq’s doing” that she is going to Morocco to learn Arabic. I look upon this beautiful girl, her clear blue eyes swimming in tears, how Allah SWT has blessed Shireen, Paul and me with her love and compassion.

We start to walk towards the Last Collection and there is E , Tariq’s co host on the radio. He has grown even taller, his face serious and thoughtful, as he speaks of Tariq, another transparent heart reaching out to us with love and affection.

Outside it is raining, thundering and dark though the evening is young. We walk into the auditorium, it looks different from the last time I sat here with Tariq listening to the Dean of students, he relaxed in body, alert in mind drinking in what she was saying and totally immersed in the moment. The day bright and sunshiny, unlike today.

We are seated in the front row; the seats are all filled with graduating students and their loved ones. As Ben begins his talk, walking the path with Tariq by his side, my mind wanders like a lost child between Paul silently sobbing on my right and Shireen dabbing her eyes carefully restrained in her display of emotion on my left.

Ben………..opening a window of Tariq’s life at Swarthmore, sharing him with us, in so many ways. While I am listening to Ben, latching on to the new memories of Tariq, wanting to walk the paths of Swarthmore, hearing Tariq’s laugh as he cracks up on something Ben says, I am once again thrown into the role of the mediator. The role I have played all my life where I have to shelve my own concerns and feelings because others so close to me are in distress……

I am deeply grateful to Allah SWT for Ben, G and all of Tariq’ friends, colleagues and even younger students who came after the presentation to hug me, share some of Tariq’s memories, and tell us how glad and appreciative they were of our presence here.

………….And so the evening passed, a rite of passage for Tariq’s friends to leave Swat and take as a small part of the memory of Swat, something of Tariq, perhaps his characteristic laugh, his humor or his music with them, filtered into the transparency of their hearts like sunshine to bring joy at unexpected moments far away somewhere where life takes them.

…………And after Paul and Shireen left for home that night of the Last Collection, I stayed back to witness the passage of Tariq’s class into adulthood.

Starting with fireworks that night on the Parrish Beach as Tariq affectionately called the lawn in front of Parrish Hall, and ending with a beautiful sparkling morning of grace, beauty and idealism at the Scott Amphitheatre.

As each graduate walked into their own private future, each was blessed by Allah SWT to reach into their core for the hidden gem of purity called ‘fitra’ given by Him, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.

MY HANDS………………..

I am looking at my hands as I raise them and spread them out in supplication.
My hands are a memory bank of the imprint of my life.
My hands throwing a hard ball while playing cricket with my brothers,
My hands learning to embroider,
My hands feeling the rough stone of the inside stairwell of the minaret of the Badshahi mosque

My hands, holding on to my youngest brothers hands on the bus to prevent him from getting lost.
My hands clutching the pole in the public bus as it lurches through the city streets to my college
My hands reeking with formaldehyde from the dissection Hall
My hands painting posters for my brother’s election in the Medical College student Council
Anju’s hands efficiently finding the hidden nerves in the cadaver,
Shehla’s hands delicately painting a picture
My hands buckling my seat belt on the plane to the US
My hands crushing the juniper leaf from a tree in Balochistan to inhale the unique fragrance.
My hands hanging on to the jeeps seat as we travel through the bandit section of the road in Balochistan
Nailah’s hands nurturingly icing a chocolate cake
My hands making a design with mehndi for Eid for my daughter.
Ammi’s hands soft as silk.
My hands holding Ammi’s hands reassuring her before she died.
My brother’s hands caressing my mother’s forehead.

My hands rubbing cream on my mothers back and the fragrance of honeysuckle permeating the room
My hands arranging Paul’s flowers in our house for Eid

My hands giving Eidi to my little kids and their friends on Eid
My hands clapping for my children’s elementary school plays
My hands taking notes in the PTO meeting.
My hands receiving the welcome bouquet as I enter the limo in Taiwan for a World Federation Meeting.
My hands holding on to my daughter at an international airport for fear of losing her.
My hands touching the small sharks in Belize and marvelling at God’s creatures.
My hands afraid of touching the mustard coral in the ocean

My hands holding a mother whose child has died, never realizing I was next.

My hands pulling down my sons head in life to kiss him.
My hands touching my son’s cold unyielding face in the coffin
My hands gently letting the rose petals fall into his grave
My hands raised for supplication to Allah begging Him (SWT)

My hands on the tawaf tasbeeh keeping count of the circles.
My hands raised to say Allah o Akbar at the Hajre Aswad
My hands on the Multazim, and my brain stammering in my supplication.
My hands on the cool marble of the Masjid e Haraam during salaat.
My hands wet with zam zam
My hands pinning my hijab to go to the Haram
My hands opening the blue Quran in the Masjid e Nabvi
My hands clinging to my daughters hand in the tawaf of Hajj
My hands throwing the pebbles at shaytan at the jamaraat
My brothers hand on my feverish forehead soothing me
My father’s hands checking me for fever
My mother’s hands lifting my head to feed me in illness
My husbands efficient hands fixing what is broken
Mel’s hands easing the pain out of my rotator cuff injury
Shireen’s hands efficiently wrapping gifts for my friends and family.
Tariq’s hands patiently unfurling a snarl of cables for the computer
Tariq hands gingerly throwing the soccer ball from the corner
Tariq’s hands drawing a detailed city of 2046
Aunty Q’s hands patiently shelling a pomegranate for me.
My hands putting eye drops in Ammi’s eyes
My hands making my mothers favorite breakfast
My hands on the wheel, driving to an adventure
My hands on the keyboard pouring my heart out.
Sophie’s hands gently playing the piano

My hands at peace in my lap as I recite my morning adkaars

My hands lifted in supplication

The Prophet’s (PBUH) hands bringing mercy to mankind

My hands bearing witness against me or for me on the Day of Judgment.
My hands………….. the repository of the imprint of my life moments

What are your hands doing?

IT IS BEFORE CHRISTMAS………..

It is before Christmas and I am driving through North Carolina again………….
I am in North Carolina and I am at Jan’s house, there is an air of festivity, and several people from Jim’s church are there. We are all going to the Christmas tea at Old Salem at Jim’s invitation. As I walk out of Jan’s house with the rest of them, the night air is like a kiss of an innocent child, clean fresh and brisk. Old Salem is a stone’s throw from Jan’s house; the streets are decked with Christmas colors and lights. Jim buys the tickets for everyone, and we enter the Moravian Christmas tea tour. As we walk through the Christmas scenes lighted and decorated, I hear the Old Salem Musicians start their music. They are playing Silent Night………. I stop to listen to the music, there are no words, the music touches my soul. I am unaware at that moment that it will always haunt me.
As we leave Old Salem, I thank Jim for inviting me; he is gracious in his response. I look at him and Jan together and even though I do not know him I can see that he makes Jan shine, that is all that is important. The man she is to marry makes her glow.
Being in Old Salem at Christmas is like being in a time warp where time has stopped. I enjoy the bracing cold as well as the clear starlit night as we walk back to Jan’s house for the Christmas goodies.
In my observation, Christmas is not a date but a season, it has many nuances. It ushers in the cold season, the air is fresh and the nights are clear and starlit. The red bows and the green foliage bring a sense of festivity and at night, the subtle twinkling lights call silently to the traveler or stranger promising warmth and hospitality inside the homes.
Christ after whom Christmas is named is the Christian name for Jesus (AS) a revered Prophet of Allah and for some more than that. Maryam (AS) or Mary the mother of Jesus is one of the honorable women addressed in the Quran. Her son Jesus (AS) is addressed as Essa ibn e Maryam thus identifying him by his mother’s name, and honoring her.
In the Quran the story of Christmas begins with the mother of Mary (AS) as follows:
The Mother of Mary (AS) is from the House of Imran. She is an extremely pious woman. When she is expecting a baby, she bequeaths her unborn child to the service of Allah.
Allah Subhanawataala in the Quran says this about the mother of Mary (AS):

“Behold!” A woman from the House of Imran said
‘O’ My Lord I do
Dedicate unto Thee
What is in my womb
For Thy special service:
So accept this of me
For thou hearest
And knowest all things.”
Quran 3:35

The story of the mother of Mary continues in the Quran:

When she delivered,
She said: “O My Lord!
Behold I am delivered of a female child!”
And God knew best
What she brought forth….
“And nowise is the male
Like the female
I have named her Mary,
And I commend her
And her offspring
To thy protection
From the evil one
The Rejected.”
Quran 3:36

The pathos of the innocence of Mary as a “mother to be” is beautifully mentioned in the Quran where Allah Subhanawa taala says:

Behold! The angels said:
“ O Mary! God giveth thee
Glad tidings of a Word
From Him: his name will be Christ Jesus,
The son of Mary, held in honor,
In this world and the Hereafter
And of (the company) of those nearest to God.

He shall speak to the people
In childhood and in maturity.
And he shall be (of the company)
Of the Righteous.
Quran 3: 45-46

Mary (AS) a virgin and a pious woman is shocked and Allah Subhanawataala relates her response in the story in the Quran for the benefit of Prophet Muhammad Peace and Blessings upon him and his Ummah:

She said:” O My Lord!
How shall I have a son
When no man hath touched me/”
He said: “Even so:
God createth
What he willeth:
When he hath decreed
A plan, but he saith
To it,’Be’, and it is!

And God will teach him
The Book of Wisdom,
The Law and the Gospel
Quran 3: 47-48

When Allah Subhanawataala is asked as to how will a child be born without a father He (SWT) says in the Quran:

The similitude of Jesus
Before God is that of Adam;
He created him from dust,
Then said to him: “Be”:
And he was.
Quran 3: 59

Surah Maryam 19:16-33 describes the childbirth and the response of the people in her community. 

Sometimes when one loves and reveres someone excessively, we can attribute powers to them that are not possible except from God. Perhaps some day if muslims no longer read the Quran, or if the Quran is changed in its text by humans, they may start glorifying the Prophet of Allah to a stature beyond what is commanded by Allah in his Book, or (God forbid) may attribute him to be God or His son. However, at this time there is no danger of that because muslims are struggling to find out what is in the Quran and are not even at the initial stages of reverence for anyone.

My musings regarding Christmas as related to Prophet Jesus (AS) end abruptly, because Christmas as it is celebrated now is not about the birth of Jesus (AS) but more a get together holiday with families. From my vantage, it has become a day, when the measure of a person’s love is titrated by the number of dollars spent on a gift given publicly. Thus causing elation in some and humiliation in others.
I look out of my car window; it is dark except for the green signs designating the various cities of North Carolina. I am transported to another time when ……..I was here.
It is before Christmas and I am driving to North Carolina, this time I am deeply sad and extremely worried for Jan. Her husband of three months has been hit by a truck and has severed his brainstem.
Driving to North Carolina has always been for happy reasons in the past, Being at Jan’s house or with her around Christmas has always been a fun occasion…………but today is different.
I have no idea what Christians do when someone dies. Jim’s father is a minister, he would know. Never having been in this situation before, I call upon the tradition according to the guidance of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) as practiced by my family. I know that no matter what the distance I have to be there for my friend and ease her through this treacherous time in her life.
If Jim is brain dead and he has donated his organs, which will be removed shortly, I have to read some ayahs of the Quran. There are particular surahs to read to ease the tumultuous process of the departure of his spirit and soul from his body. I am hesitant, Will Jim’s family be offended if I read the Quran for their Christian son?
What awaits me is nothing that life or medicine had ever prepared me for. I am at the Hospital. The same hospital where I spent many happy carefree days during my residency. The hospital rooms and even the corridors seem alien when seen from the patient’s perspective. The waiting room is spilling over with hordes of people whose families are in the ICU.
Jan is in conference with the organ donation team. Jim has been declared brain dead and is being “kept alive” on the ventilator, to keep his organs viable.
I ask if I can see Jim. They allow me to do so and take me to his room. I enter the room in the ICU and stand by his bedside. I can hear the familiar hiss of the ventilator as it pumps air into Jim. His chest rises and falls with it. His eyes are closed and his expression is peaceful. I touch his hand and it is warm, and as I hold his wrist, his pulse is alive and regular. I am stunned. I know now how confusing this is to a layman and now it is to me at a spiritual level: The man lying on this bed hooked to a ventilator, his expression at peace and his pulse bounding with life is actually dead?
I try to recall Surah Yaseen. I have been told, that if one reads Surah Yaseen while someone is dying or dead, the removal of his soul from his body is eased. I try but I cannot recall the words. I fall back on the familiar Surah Fatiha and the four quls. I am on the second qul when there is some commotion, the door to Jim’s room is flung open and the organ donation team comes in. They wait till I finish and take Jim to the operating room. As his stretcher disappears behind the swinging doors of the Operating Room, I am suddenly completely bereft.
I leave the corridor to the OR where Jims stretcher has disappeared with Jim forever, and turn to Jan. I want to offer her some comfort and some words of condolence. As I search for them I find that words of condolence are strangers to my tongue. It would be many years later that she would be offering me the same after another car accident.

The music of  ‘Silent Night’ fills my car………..Once again it is before Christmas and I am driving through North Carolina. Jan has lost Jim and I have lost Tariq and yet we continue to live, wondering how to spend this season.