Poetry Overflowing…!

Peace, one and all…

In my last post of the morning, here are a few more poems.  Enjoy…

O my Lord!  Help me to be ever grateful for Your favours.  Let me never deny even the smallest of them.

If Guessing Be Not Hazardous…

‘When my life’s race has been run
and I have left this world behind,
what memories will take with me?
As I commence my final journey,
alone across the dark void,
which of my life’s remembered moments
will I choose to see again?
I have no answer to give as yet,
but let me hazard a guess,
if guessing be not hazardous:
children playing;
my wife’s gentle voice;
my mother’s wisdom
and my father’s concern;
not the clever words of intellectual fools
or lovers of uncertain intent’.

Credit

‘My words are all on loan,
bought on credit from One Wealthy and Generous.
And though they come through me,
their origin lies elsewhere.
When I try to add words of my own imagining,
my selfish desires cause them to be born defective.
Your gift is on loan, O Soul.
And though God gives without caprice,
He will one day require an accounting’.

O Soul of Mine

‘O Soul of mine,
leave your selfish desires before
they bring sadness
and calamity upon you.

O Soul of mine,
heed not the dark urgings of your intemperate ego,
lest all that you have learned depart,
and its passing become a proof against you.

O Soul of mine,
know in all truth that God’s eye is fixed upon you.
Nothing escapes His notice,
and all deeds must be accounted for.

O Soul of mine,
what you have been given is indeed fit for its purpose;
God has given you what you truly need,
not what your iron heart merely desires.

So, O Soul of mine,
leave such things beside you,
and pursue them no more.
Make your risings pure,
and your lowerings blessed;
and stand justified before God and His angels.

Allahumma innaka `Afuwwun tuhibbul `afwa fa`fu anni Ya Ghafur!

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

More Poetry…

Peace, one and all…

In the interests of space, I’ve decided to post a few of my most recent poems together.  Enjoy…

Ya Rahman!  Have mercy upon me and my family; be with us always.

Into Port

‘Once more my heart’s ship
has sailed into port,
resting for a while from it travels
upon life’s wide ocean.
Ramadan’s blessed moon signals peace,
and a time for repairs.
Time now to plug leaks and fix
weather-worn sails,
and time to thank God
for hull, rudder and ability to sail.
Now that Ramadan draws to a close,
I must emerge from port and
sail upon the open seas once more.
O God! I Pray for a calm sea and a goodly wind,
that I might speed swiftly to You,
upon the further shore.

Home and Hearth

‘I thank God for the blessing of a warm, loving family.
To spend idle moments in each other’s company,
or to talk of more weigthy matters,
are both equally blessed.
The more I ponder the meanings of life,
the more a truth becomes clear to me:
People spend so much time in useless acquisition,
and naked self-aggrandisement,
that they miss the simple pleasures of home and hearth.
Watching my father-in-law rest his eyes for a moment,
as the playful noise of children enfolds us,
is a blessing more certain than the
arid frigidity of cold intellectual discourse,
where all is cleverness wihout soul,
and words without communion.

Within the Walls of my Home

‘Enter my home in peace and safety,
and may your stay with us be blessed.
Here you may rest for a while,
before journeys begin anew.
Within the walls of my home
you’ll find solace,
and a cooling balm
for a heart aflame.
I offer no deep meanings but one:
loving kindness found in the company
of a simple human heart’.

No Heart for Fighting…

Peace, one and all…

Here’s poem number 6 (I was a busy boy this morning)!  Enjoy…

O my Lord!  Help me against my wayward desires and their evil consequences.

No Heart for Fighting 

‘Don’t fight with me
for I have no heart for it.
I would rather save my strength,
for battles necessary and worthy.
My life’s too short to fight with any but
my own soul
and its wayward desires.
But, if you desire speech,
then I am at your service.
For a good word,
uttered with a pure intention,
can leap from my heart to yours.
The all need for fighting would disappear
and each would behold the other truly’.

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

I Fear to Boil…

Peace, one and all…

Poem 5 returns to more strictly personal matters.  Ya Allah!  You are the goal of all; help me to reach You!

I Fear to Boil…

‘O my Lord!
You turn the night into day,
and day into night.
In the same way, You turn our hearts
in a constant ebb and flow of Love.

O my Lord!
You test us with all of life’s ills
and all of life’s calamities,
as is Your right;
I seek no argument with Your blessed decree.
Rather, I submit with a willing heart.

But my Lord, the tests are difficult
and I have no hope of success,
should You withhold Your favour.

And though the chickpea must go into the pot,
it still fears to boil…’

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

Even If You Don’t Believe…

Peace, one and all…

My fourth poem of the morning continues in a similar vein to number 3.  Enjoy…

O Lord!  I ask for Your aid in my every endeavour.

Even If You Don’t Believe

‘Allah has created us in mercy and love,
yet we wastefully spend our lives in bitterness and hatred.
And, even if you don’t believe in God,
surely you must see hatred’s utter pointlessness.
Indeed, if you believe that nothing lies beyond this realm,
as is your God-given right,
then entrenched bitterness
is folly multiplied.
If all is meaningless,
then shouldn’t your aim be to make that chaos easier to bare,
for yourself and those around you?’

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

This Island Home

Peace, one and all…

Here’s number 3.  O God!  Forgive me for my sins, for they lay heavily upon my darkened heart.

This Island Home

‘You would seek to cast me out of my island home,
to deprive me and my family of our homes and our rights.
But I was born amidst this green and pleasant land,
as were my fathers before me.
By what right do you seek such a thing,
when my grandfathers fought bravely against Hitler’s madness,
and my great-grandfathers took up the sword
in defence of home and hearth.
I am of this land:
the old blood of Angle and Saxon, Celt and Viking,
flows through my veins and those of my children’.

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

Fear of Difference

Peace, one and all…

Here’s another of this morning’s poems.  Ya Allah!  Grant me a pure intention to serve You alone.

Fear of Difference

‘Fear of difference runs through the veins of Adam’s children.
‘Get out: you’re not of us’.
Such differences are merely a clothing,
of culture,
of skin tone,
of belief.
But Adam’s children are still Adam’s children,
and should that label be felt unbecoming,
we are all human.
We all love our mothers and our fathers,
our spouses and our children.
The rest is merely another way of dressing the essential Self,
in the soil of distant lands.
And if all the earth is one,
and all of it belongs to God,
then how is one part superior to any other?’

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman

When All Is Said And Done…

Peace, one and all…

I’m currently at my in-laws’ house, on the outskirts of London.  We’ve come for a few days for Eid; insha Allah, we’ll be here until Tuesday.

After Fajr this morning, I was feeling inspired and wrote a few poems.  So the next few posts are the fruits of these labours.  Enjoy and may Allah bless them and grant me the ability to offer them to you all with a pure intention.

When All is Said and Done

‘When this world is concluded,
and all has been said and done.
Will our selfish actions
have been truly worthwhile?

Will all of our petty rivalries
and trivial ignorances
have been worth all that trouble?

Will all those unfocused wants
and childish desires
comfort us as we sit,
pondering our lives,
naked and afraid?

The more I reflect upon the ways of the world,
the more clearly my heart sees,
and the more I polish my unworthy mirror,
the more certain I become.

The only truly worthwhile deed,
the only thing worthy of notice,
is loving kindness.

It goes by many names,
but names call to mind One Essence,
as rain drops call to mind
the Sea.

Compassion, goodness, wholeness
are all Love
described by a different name.

Love God and Love others,
that is all that counts,
and the only thing that is truly lasting:
all else is either avarice disguised
or illusion misunderstood’.

Ma’as salama,
Abdur Rahman