A woman touched by Rights...

The city of pain rose above towering mountains and straightened valleys, lacing the crimson Western line with passionate hearts ready to break another fast. The linen, multipurposed and strong, laid neatly between legs and guns, as children, women and lanky old men threw their meager portions of dates and fruits, apportioned to them by Providence-hands through UN aides.

Aisha Begum wiped the tears of her now crippled son, my dear Hafiz about whom the Holy Prophet on whom be peace said, ‘Whosoever recites the Qur’aan and practices upon it, his parents will be given to wear a crown on the Day of Judgement. The brightness of the crown will be brighter than the sun which rises in one’s house. What do you think will be the reward of the person who actually practices upon the Qur’aan?', remembering the staggering 'errant' bombs and now wanting someone to do the same to her as she really missed her husband Khalid and only daughter. In quick succession she laid them in the grave of martyrs, with the Pesh Imam praying the silent prayers of hundreds daily, her family's Janaza went without much ceremony. Still young and educated, she at least enjoyed the triple happiness of husband, salary without work and a home before this brutal fiasco. Now the barbarians celebrate, hers and a nation's plight, frightening as 92, she remembered her father saying, when Aqsa was taken in the 11th century the horses waded through Muslim blood too! Across the Masjid courtyard people bustled as the Azan sounded, marking another fast, another Iftar without the homeliness of Ramadan the Begums and Khans knew. Maybe, a silent prayer, that needs to be added after Taraweeh now, the years ahead will be improved, not through pipelining perks and fast food chains, for our milk and wheat 'roti' are irreplaceable by even Arab zamzam or Bangladeshi rice, but this sojourn will take a new toll as Iman once fired in the mixed blood of ethnic dire-hards is almost impossible to extinguish even by the oceans of truces and hi-tech advances.

Only yesterday, Aisha thought, I dreamt the Garden Valley, and saw my younger brother danced to the rhythms of celestial musicians, clad in silken robes and garlanded rubies, and again I knew our people's destiny lies between Death and Faith. But why is it orchestrated to a theatrical drama of 'our people and their people' when the teachings of Allah says as Jabir reported: "I heard Allah's Messenger,owbp, saying: The throne of Iblis is upon the ocean and he sends detachments globally in order to put people to trial and the most important figure in his eyes is one who is most notorious in sowing the seed of dissension."?

Meanwhile the refugee camps cramped the fatigued stomachs, miraculously squeezing the hearts with soaring spirits, thanks to the Ramadanic aura. "By the One in Whose hand my self is, the smell of the breath of a man fasting is better with Allah than the scent of musk.' It's as if we were smelling it already in the din of roasted human flesh and charring mud-huts.

Strategic placement of us, the poorly forgotten, in the middle of black gold, will always create fierce enemies who cannot phantom our custom of collective Iftar and drinking from Heavenly Kauthar one day, so what about being clad from lustful stares and fighting until the last drop of blood for every tear. Lebanese Kahlil Gibran was right when he said 'Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that you cannot bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel all you are beyond that pain.'

Habeeb



Ramadan Greetings!

Have a peaceful day.

Habeeb hujja@networksgy.com>

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