RANDOM REMINDERS………….

I am working and I glance out of the window at the falling rain and wonder……if the grass is sprouting from the seeds I left on his grave……..

I sit down to write and someone has pushed the keyboard to the right making place for his left-handedness………..

Three butterflies chasing each other………

My days are sprinkled with the diamonds of my memories, clear scintillating and razor edged sharp with loss.

And I remind myself to say: Inna lil lahi wa inna elaye rajeown…..

THE SPANISH MOSS……..

I am on the island, I am gliding down the avenue lined by old Oaks with the Spanish moss draping them closely and the tresses hanging low as if to hold on to the memories they have witnessed.

I am counting the miles just like I did when I was with him.

He is sitting up alert but pretending to be relaxed as he stretches his long skinny legs, as we negotiate the bends and turn left into the condos. Today I turn right and I am alone.

In the apartment I am listening to Coldplay with the muted sounds coming from his computer just like the other day.

There is a stillness in the room……….we have just finished dinner, he says “Mom this is the best dinner I have ever eaten” my heart swells with happiness………..such uncomplicated moments; he is another person when he is with me, his guard is down and he is soft, affectionate and considerate.

This island unlike the other one has only one memory and no more. Its him and me and me and him spending our last vacation together, unaware, of the impending parting soon to come.

Every moment is precious, I try to give him his private time, but he invites me to join him and sit with him and watch this comedy show…………and I do.

Why am I back? Why am I walking the steps of memories, why? Because my heart is full and I am tired of being brave, I just want to be where he was with me and I want to remember and savor every moment and cry, I want to cry like Yaqub AS, incessantly and continuously. He lost his son in the desert I lost mine on the highway. I want to cry and cry and cry………….

I find an old Urdu song in his collection and it takes me back to the times when I only dreamed of the future and knew without a doubt that I would be able to pull myself out of the strife and find a better life far away.

Today I know there is no escape from the incessant needling of the fingers of grief, they poke, point and rub, till the wound is raw. The loss is refreshed, with the sadness. As I pull my suitcase out of the trunk of the car, my bones feel old.

There is no lilting young step beside me. I am tired of trudging this life, and a sense of hopelessness drenches every cell of my body. I am tired, I want to go……… and then I realize I am not ready, I am afraid of the FIRE, and I have not done enough to erase my sins and I need His mercy but I also need to work for it.

And so ends another day………….

JULY 09 READINGS

WHAT WAS READ A FEW TIMES:

Surah Al Anaam 6:1-24 for……..
78:08 And (have We not) Created You in Pairs
THE HOUSE, MY SANCTUARY
HAJJ Mabrook to the HAjjiis and Eid Mubarak
Ya Ayohan Naas….. O’ Mankind
PREPARATION FOR UMMRAH
What RasoolAllaah (saws) read or emphasized in prayer
BEHAVIORIAL CLUES OF THE HYPOCRITES: 9:5
THE BLESSING….
ABOUT FASTS AND FASTING………
Islamic Perspective on Sex
WORDS………… WHAT YOU READ A LOT OF TIMES GRADUATION……. THE MOST MISQUOTED AYAHS OF THE QURAN SINCE 911 THE CONCEPT OF SABR (PATIENCE) IN ISLAM THE CONCEPT OF ‘EVENTS AT DEATH’ IN ISLAM Does Islam Allow Muslim Men To Marry Non.Muslim Women Hijab a la Syria IN PREPARATION FOR YOUR FRIEND’S WEDDING About SAJDAH- E- TILAWAT: First Sajdah in the Quran SABR IN ADVERSITY: SURAH HUD 11:9-11

TARIQ: The Star of Piercing Brightness…….

English translation with recitation from Shaykh Luhaidan and beautiful illustrations:

English translation with recitation by Shaykh Alafasy with his mesmeric voice:

and with urdu translation:

and in pashtu translation

THE KNOCKING ON THE DOOR………

Door in Old Damascus

I can feel it knocking on the door, and I am trying to ignore it, the methods used for ignoring are not healthy, and create more anxiety.
Sometimes the knocking becomes insistent and cannot be completely ignored and for a fleeting second I am tempted to open the door and face the consequences and then the wall goes up and deadens the sound of the knocking………….

……………………….There is a gathering at my house. The house is filled with Tariq and Shireen’s friends. Some of them are sitting at the dining table, I am also seated with them, and she is consulting him about college. He in his most “seriously considering” manner is very graciously explaining the pros and cons of the various aspects. I silently acknowledge with surprise his maturity and thoughtful evaluation of the ramifications of the choices in college…………..and just as quickly as it came the memory fades.

Time has fast-forwarded four years, she is done with college and we are all celebrating her graduation dinner. This gathering is very different from her high school graduation dinner where he had given a speech, and one could hear laughter, and sense the air saturated with joy. Today there is a void that no one wants to acknowledge.

I feel the knocking at the door. It is grief…………. insistent on wanting admittance to my heart.

Inna lil lahi wa inna elayhe rajaeown…….

NO FEAR AND N0 GRIEF…………Surah Baqarah

The Names of Allah:courtesy www.flickr.com

Surah Baqarah2.038
قُلنَا ٱهبِطُواْ مِنہَا جَمِيعًا فَإِمَّا يَأتِيَنَّكُم مِّنِّى هُدًى فَمَن تَبِعَ هُدَاىَ فَلَا خَوفٌ عَلَيہِم وَلَا هُم يَحزَنُونَ (٣٨)
In Surah Baqarah ayah 38 Allah Subhanawataala says:
002.038 YUSUFALI: We said: “Get ye down all from here; and if, as is sure, there comes to you Guidance from me, whosoever follows My guidance, on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.

On a personal note:

Let me share with you my journey with grief and fear.
After Tariq, and his friends died, I was in severe unremitting continuous pain and grief. I took Prophet Muhammad sallalaho alaye wasalaams advice and used every halal available means to allay my grief.
The intensity of the pain was blinding and unremitting despite all the secular and medical methods.

It was in one of these moments of blinding pain that I sought the guidance of Allah Subhanawataala’s words and tapped into His promise of no fear and no grief.
I am a slow learner so after quite a while, I realized the connection, that as long as I was in the presence of my Lord, I had no fear and no grief.

Thus ignoring His Subhanawataala’s guidance and going back to the ways of dunya, the rat race and the senseless acquisition of degrees, materialistic assets and fame became moot.

Allah Subhanawataala says………….. and it is the secret of inner peace:
Verily it is in the Dhikr of Allah that hearts do find rest.

There are so many people who spend their life in search of cure for their grief in the secular zone. The modern Muslims also, like me first search all the secular sources and yet are blind to the single ayah at the front end of the Quran, which is laden with Allah’s promise.

He or she who follows Allah Subhanawataala’s guidance shall have no fear nor shall they grieve.

When you reach out and take one step towards Him Subhanawataala He takes ten……..so goes the hadith from our beloved Prophet Muhammad peace be upon Him.

I sincerely hope and pray that you do not wait for a catastrophe to happen and the pain of grief to  smother you before you actually seek His guidance.

……On The death of your son

We went with Allah’s Apostle (p.b.u.h) to the blacksmith Abu Saif, and he was the husband of the wet-nurse of Ibrahim (the son of the Prophet).

Allah’s Apostle took Ibrahim and kissed him and smelled him and later we entered Abu Saif’s house and at that time Ibrahim was in his last breaths, and the eyes of Allah’s Apostle (p.b.u.h) started shedding tears.

‘Abdur Rahman bin ‘Auf said, “O Allah’s Apostle, even you are weeping!”

He said, “O Ibn ‘Auf, this is mercy.”

Then he wept more and said, “The eyes are shedding tears and the heart is grieved, and we will not say except what pleases our Lord, O Ibrahim ! Indeed we are grieved by your separation.”

Narrated Anas bin Malik: Volume 2, Book 23, Number 390:

THE THIRD ROOM………..

I am in the first room with a lot of people they are all laughing and happy. It is a joyous occasion and I too am not sad…………..and yet I long to be in the second room.
The second room is the “lonely room” there is no one there except the rocks of my memories, the dark waters of “what ifs”, the Alligators of guilt and the sharks of Regret.
Why do I want to be in the lonely room when I can be in the first room with such a happy group of people, who are celebrating life?

The answer lies in what is at the other end of the lonely room………. I have to be brave to step into the murky waters of sadness, wade in the unknown depths of depression, avoid the Alligators of guilt and swim faster than the Sharks that can swallow me and then in their belly my skin will peel like Younus (AS) layer by layer as I am faced with regret………of actions not done.

I quietly leave the first room and wade into the lonely room, gently caressing the rocks of memories, worn down with the waves of time and sadness. I know that I cannot linger because I don’t want to drown in the murky waters, nor be swallowed by guilt or made immobile with fear of the sharks of regret………..

Thus from my past experience I begin my journey deeper and deeper into the lonely room, the words of Younus AS giving me company and tears, but never swerving from my initial purpose to reach the other side.

It had been on one desperate day that I had done the same and had swum the dark dank waters with all my strength, seeking……. seeking what? I did not know.

Guided by His (Subhanawataala’s) words coming from the lips of Younus (AS) in the belly of the whale, and I had found shore.

Climbing on to the sanctuary, small, the size of a musallah, which could barely hold my body in prostration, but lighted and protected from all predators and from the dark waters around me.

I remember I had fallen in prostration, with relief and a lightness and continued my salaat, my prayer, every supplication and surah that I knew by heart, again and again, tears streaming down my cheeks, entreating him to relieve my pain……….
And I remember distinctly a chink opening, and light streaming into the lonely room from the third room…………

I never knew that in this dark and lonely place there was an opening to the third room, I could smell fragrance, I could feel the fresh air, the sort of feeling when one comes out of cave into a verdant forest……….

Someone yells my name from the first room, I am needed, I have to fulfill my duties, and I must go back. I regretfully swim back and the door to the third room closes behind me.

Though I fear being lost in the dark waters of sadness and depression, I often long for the lonely room despite all its predators,………in the hope that I can cross it and perhaps this time enter The Third Room.

" Which of our favors will you deny" Surah Rahman

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”

The Cure For Your Heart Attack………..10:57

Dedicated to all my brothers and sisters who have suffered from a Heart Attack…………….

a letter……………….

Asalaam-o-alaikum my dear brother,

You have been in my thoughts and prayers ever since I heard of your near miss with a heart attack, I have read and re read your note updating us on your physical state. In between the lines the sadness, the sorrow, the resignation and fear of disability leak out with the pain and perseverance of being downed physically, and patched in between are rays of hope with supplications.

I have thought about writing a response and have had no words come to me till this morning as I sat down to review the tafseer of Surah Younus with Dr. Farhat Hashmi, and as I reached this ayah I felt, Allah Subhanwataala was putting words where I had none …………

يَـٰٓأَيُّہَا ٱلنَّاسُ قَدۡ جَآءَتۡكُم مَّوۡعِظَةٌ۬ مِّن رَّبِّڪُمۡ وَشِفَآءٌ۬ لِّمَا فِى ٱلصُّدُورِ وَهُدً۬ى وَرَحۡمَةٌ۬ لِّلۡمُؤۡمِنِينَ (٥٧)

(O mankind! There hath come unto you an exhortation from your Lord, a balm for that which is in the breasts, a guidance and a mercy for believers. (10: 57)
and:
17.082
We send down (stage by stage) in the Qur’an that which is a healing and a mercy to those who believe: to the unjust it causes nothing but loss after loss.

As Dr. Farhat Hashmi explained, I was rooted to the  spot:
Tafseer:

A man came to RasoolAllah (pbuh) and he complained about his heart and said, “ I have pain in my heart” RasoolAllah responded “read (recite) Quran because Allah SWT says that this Quran is a cure for what is in the breast. (Your heart) “

In the chest resides the heart and it has lots of diseases both spiritual and physical. In The spiritual diseases include envy (hasad) riya, keena, badgumani, anger, badneeyati, arrogance, depression, sadness, sorrow, ujub, Bughuz, and many others.
Allah Subhanawataala has given the cure to Mankind at large and to the Momineen specifically

However, when do the words of God become a cure? This depends on if the cure is known and used, in the therapeutic manner that has been prescribed by Allah Subhanwataala and I paraphrase “for truly in Dhikr do ones heart finds rest”.

If the medicine that is going to cure an ailment sits on a counter and is not administered it does not work. Medicine only works when the medicine is taken at the correct time in the correct dose, and in the ideal frequency. Thus is the Quran it cannot be a cure if it sits unused in both the frequency and doses as prescribed by our Rasool (pbuh). If it remains in a bookshelf wrapped in a cover, it cannot work as a cure for our hearts.

The first step is to believe that Allah Subhanataala has given us the solution of every problem in dunya in the Quran. How does the Quran become a cure? It becomes a cure for our ailment when one honestly and sincerely begins to recite and review the Quran, the answers and solutions unravel as one reads, reviews and connects with yaqeen with Allah through His Subhanwataala’s words.

If psychologically one does not have yaqeen that Allah has sent this as a cure, it does not work. Neither does it work if one is insincere, and the ikhlaas between Allah and me is missing. The wall of cynicism, insincerity and arrogance in ones own abilities has to come down for the cure to be poured on us and instilled in us.

When we sit and read the Quran, the pain, the fear, the sorrow that is in our hearts and chest eases as Allah Subhanawataala’s words speak to us.
Only if we have approached Him and His words with sincerity with the true belief and yaqeen that He truly does what is best for us, and that He created us and wants us to turn to Him when in difficulty or in pain. It is only then that His words, and instructions become the cure.
As I listened to her tafseer  I reflected on my own experience and I share it with you:

My experience:
If one approaches the Quran in search for a cure, as a solution for pain both physical and psychological, and we place all our symptoms, pains, aches, disabilities, and agonies in front of Him and we recite His words in search…………..of solutions, He turns to us.

He guides our hands and minds to the solutions hidden in the pages of the Mushaf.
Something we may have read before with a closed heart and mind or as a literary interest rather than a spiritual act of seeking help, cure, and treatment, now transforms into a solution to our desperate search.

Suddenly the pages open to the words that seem like they were written for me. Words that are the cure for the pain in my heart, for my tired brain searching for solace, peace and comfort. I wonder how come I had read this ayah before and it had never registered as a solution of my continuing agony and my persistent ailment of huzn.

Being an allopathic physician we are taught to discount all spiritual aspects of treatment. The reason being that some charlatans have used it to dupe innocent people, who are in need of help for either a physical ailment that does not respond to regular medicine or an agony for which they have been told there is no cure. Thus we as physicians have used the either or paradigm and discarded the process as well as the source without really looking into the reasons.

Thus as I read the Quran knowing that all avenues of help and solace are closed and that I desperately need His help, for the pain is unremitting and there is no relief in sight, I am keenly aware that the only way the agony in my breast, of loss, loneliness and separation from my child, can ease, lies in His hands. I realize that I can only get to the cure through Him.

I also know that this time the act of opening the Quran is not like the hundred others in the past. This time it is a focused search till I find it, whether it comes with the first line or last………..

Thus it has been for me, at any time of the day or night.

One morning before work, I am in agony as I find myself standing in the computer room, and the Quran lying on my desk calls to me. I stand irresolute, immobile, frozen with grief near the computer seeing my son in my minds eye, smiling and vibrant with life and then he dissolves in front of my eyes and I cannot even recall an image.
I take a step and I open the cover and randomly open a section…….and read. From the depths of darkness He lowers a rope for me: ”every soul will taste death” and” and the believers who are tested will say: It is from him we come and to him we shall return:
002.155: Be sure we shall test you with something of fear and hunger, some loss in goods or lives or the fruits (of your toil), but give glad tidings to those who patiently persevere,
002.156 Who say, when afflicted with calamity: “To Allah We belong, and to Him is our return”:
002.157: They are those on whom (Descend) blessings from Allah, and Mercy, and they are the ones that receive guidance.

…………and yet at other times I want to find an ayah and I cannot find it .………. someone has told me about it in the passing that it brings relief, and I cannot find it……..it is only when I sit at a spiritual retreat studying the word of the Divine, thousands of miles away from home, that in an atmosphere charged with the words of Allah Subhanawataala, as I listen to Surah Zumar, that I suddenly come upon it.

I am in a room where the Surah is being recited, reviewed and explained, surrounded by pious women that His Subhanawataala’s words of solace,and forgiveness engulf my heart like a poultice of cure, bringing instant relief. The written words are blurred with my tears but now I can find them as they are engraved on my heart “la taknatu mer rahmatullah………..
039.053 Say: “O my Servants who have transgressed against their souls! Despair not of the Mercy of Allah: for Allah forgives all sins: for He is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.

039.054: “Turn ye to our Lord (in repentance) and bow to His (Will), before the Penalty comes on you: after that ye shall not be helped.

What can I say………………. I have no advice for you. You have to seek the cure with your own efforts.  I write prescriptions for my patients every day for irreversible diseases of the brain and yet I have been searching for a medicine for my own heart in all the wrong places.

So to those ………who have had a heart attack and are struggling with the cardiac drugs know that you too will die one day and that day is fixed, and nothing you do will change it. All suffering before you do so and after you do so, depends entirely on how you conduct the days of your life (with respect to Allah Subhanawataala) after the heart attack.

I am honored that He, Subhanawataala has handed me The Cure to my pain, and yet it is I who must take the correct dose, at the correct time and with the correct frequency, for when I forget in the distractions of dunya, the agony of grief returns with a vengeance.

The Quran………the Divine word in my house, on my desk, needs to be in my heart constantly and consistently to bring me peace, love and purity.

May Allah Subhanwataala give you the cure for your heart and may you use it as instructed by RasoolAllah pbuh, and may it bring you relief, heart health and keep you on the path of Allah, who is The Giver and The Healer. Ameen

Please forgive me for my past mistakes and if I have said or done anything to offend you. Everything correct that I have said is from Allah Subhanawataala and anything wrong is from me and from the wasswassaas of Shaitaan on me and my Nafs. May Allah Subhanawataala forgive me and accept my efforts. I am deeply thankful for all He has given me.

As you read this please remember to keep me in your prayers

Your sister in Islam