Friday, September 28, 2012

To just write straight. Not entrenched in false emotions brought on by external influences, I want to ink myself into paper and just lay there until the time comes I feel like feeling again.


I blame that new On the Road film I saw yesterday. Darned film. Damned Kerouac. Dastard Cassady. Oh, folly.


The film reminded me that although I strain myself to be in harmony with everybody, I am sad inside. I am sad but it is alright. It is not an empty sadness. It is the kind borne out of a keen awareness of the state of being. I believe it is a good thing to be reminded of sadness even when feeling joy because c'est la vie. One's presence ought not be the source of consternation to others. What is acted out and uttered affects people. I am not one to be ruled by my emotions (not in public), I try to always strive to respond in kind. What is a person if not good character.

A friend confided to me about her suddenly very ill brother, the expectations imposed upon her as a medic student studying in Australia, the exams she is currently sitting etc. When a person pours their soul to you, you listen, you emphatize and no matter how hard, you find the words that you hope would ease their burden even if just a little.

Saturday, September 22, 2012

The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), as the messenger, is the exemplar. He was honest, kind & modest. Noble. I just feel like reflecting on this at the moment. His entire life was a life of service.

I am keenly aware that the sweetness of imparting kindness & receiving kindness is unlike any other. Those who put the needs of others above them, what a mercy they are to this world. I've met many of them over here in Melbourne. Their ideals are One and true. They exude an air of purity, of lightness and they always smile. With modesty they walk, with modesty they talk. Fact is, modesty is not a celebrated virtue. Too many regard it as too plain, dull. Vying to be unique, to what end? There are too many forms of vanity in this world. 

The reliable soul is a rarity.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

I went to the beach last Sunday. The sand, sea & sky spread before my eyes was like a balm. The joy, the soothing effect of simply looking at space is almost uncontainable. Man has been conditioned to live within the confines of four adjacent walls that we stop noticing the suffering of the sight. Beaches have personalities. No two are the same.The one I went to had  surprising orange sand. The sky overcast with low-hanging clouds, there was fog in the distance towards the sea (it was pretty early in the morning), and the water a steely greyish blue hue. 

As usual, when I stare at the sea a loftiness wells inside me & I feel whole. As if I am witnessing reality as it is. A concrete metaphor of this world & its people. That particular brand of solitude steps into you, the peaceful kind. The sort when you feel utterly alone but content. Content as in that melancholy tinged silently joyful feeling. Like a glass of cool water at noontime of the first day of Spring when it's chilly still but the Sun is shining.
I examine myself in a subdued manner, reconciling what sentiments I have about my state in relation to the world around me, to time & to the ideals I hold in my heart. Childishness is a refusal of truth, idiocy the ignorance of it. 

 كُنْ فِي الدُّنْيَا كَأَنَّكَ غَرِيبٌ، أَوْ عَابِرُ سَبِيلٍ
Be in the world as if you are a stranger or a wayfarer.
[Sahih Bukhari, Volume 8, Book 76, Number 425]
This hadith is an excellent reminder of the briefness of life.
The wayfarer is lonely, he is the perpetual stranger. His treasures are immaterial, his pleasures beyond the superficial. He enjoys what he has, when he has them but does not cling. The stranger is forgiving because he knows the people that populate his world are but brief encounters.

Friday, September 14, 2012

to M

(Read yours. That was great. I scribbled shite in my iPod notes to you several days ago. I thought I'd reciprocate heh. But just this once. Not here anyway. Would've posted this but no more blue paper. Tak biru tak best. Don't think I have to explain myself anymore. The stuff I write to you, the line blurs between the two yous I address, hence the line between absolute truth & embellished sleep-deprivation induced rants [which is what ALL of this really is] you know that by now. Bear with me. )

11th - 13th September

Where do I fit in relation to all of this? Pouring yourself away into the other. Declarations of love. And all that. What do I feel exactly? I am reluctant to be spiteful just as I am reluctant to accept being entirely happy about this situation. I ought deflate my ego, fall to the ground and bury my bruised pride alive. I ought to distance myself from you & your intimacies with him. Thing is isn't that a betrayal on my part? Although I feel thwarted, somewhat, by all this. I swore an oath in my heart to always be loyal to you. But what of me? Inconsequential really but I can't help myself. I am choking on the fumes of your love. What burns give off smoke. And I, having been tethered by you in such proximity to the roman candles of your love has left me slowly dying, alone. But you hold me with your artless gazes and laughter so I remain delighted & let my lungs constrict in my chest.

I stand by you still. Haven't I always?

What servant's loyalty to their sovereign do not waver? Loyalty can only be known through trials of its sincerity. What I am saying is, sometimes I waver. It matters to me all this. I regard all this with utmost importance.

I'm not sure if I'm up for it after all. I regard my feelings back then with a kind of sanctity. But. I do want to do this. 'Invade their waters'. But. Buts. I won't be sincere. My writings won't be pure. I don't know about you but my reluctance to unearth the past in this manner is not out of laziness. Never. It is out of something greater. With more forbearance.

I don't expect you to understand this. Not ever. After all, you're my Wall & I never yours. Not anybody. Which is why you're mine & I'll never be yours nor shall I ever resent you fully for it. This is the way things are. I orbit you always & you the star burn away, blinded by your own light.

This is it. I now have the root of my secret that is my perception of you. The you in my mind that may or may not ever exist at all. It doesn't matter. I do not need to be backed up by something that is unnatural. It is unnatural for you to be concerned with my affairs. I address you but never you me. Whatever you've written on those disparate pieces of paper you waved before me I expect nothing of them. Why? For you will never regard me as I regard you. I am incapable of such significance. I do not possess the wings of Icarus. Not even a pair of waxen wings. No. I cannot fly towards you & destroy myself in the process. I can only pine over my loneliness & grapple at your throne in the sky within the folds of darkness. At night, in my dreams, when you visit me & unleash a web of tangled, inexplicable sentiments & warp me beyond recognition.

I have attempted, in those letters to unveil myself to you. I have. But I feel like I've failed. You seem to be able to gauge me but I do not believe it entirely. Perhaps what I want is for you to admit that you will never comprehend me. Neither will I ever you.

I want to witness another as they truly are. I want their essence. Not their masks. I understand though that the level of communion I seek is in all probability is non-existent in this dunia. It is divine. God only knows the unquenchable thirst of the soul. This, can only be remedied at the end of Time itself. The promised day during which our final abodes will be determined. To descend into the fire and be alienated for eternity or to ascend into the garden & finally, heal this fractured soul.

Perhaps Rumi arrived to his divine love in a way sort of like this. Maybe you're my shams of Tabriz. As you said, it's implausible that anybody could arrive to divine love effectively immediately out of the blue. He must first love his fellow human, because 'Mortal love is comprehendable' you said. I believe there is truth in that.

But to be in mortal love alone is just fanaa. Not achieving divine love through mortal love is to fail. "This dunia is the means, not the ends." I don't know who's words those are. Heard it somewhere in a Halaqah.

Love, the unspeakable. Love, the inflammable. I can string a myriad of adjectives to it & hope blindly. You, yes I am addressing you now, you, have been blessed with a gift. Contain your love in the furnace that is your heart. So you feel the warmth but not be consumed. I am in no position to be instructing you in these matters.

I smile when you smile.

Ton ami,
P.

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Ugh Imma take this off in a bit. This is too much.

Saturday, September 8, 2012

11th June

I know exactly how many news of suicide has reached me since I arrived in Australia last year. 3. The first one was the one who jumped onto the train tracks. Delayed all the trains. We had finals then. Got to take the train to get to the venue. People complained on facebook. Said stuff like 'Why'd the schmuck had to do it today?!' The second was a Malaysian student. A friend of a friend. Jumped off a cliff at coogee beach, Sydney. Body found in the ocean after he went missing for 3 days. Some cracked jokes like, 'Oooh, I won't be swimming in Cooge anytime soon.' Was a cheerful sort of guy the friend said. Unexpected. The third, a caucasian man. Jumped off the building opposite a friend's apartment. Said friend snapped a picture of the man standing on the rooftop. Sent it via whatsapp to roomie. Roomie showed it to me. Then the message 'He jumped!'. Said the noise was unbelievable when he hit the ground. Blood all over the pavement. The man wore a light blue sweater.

I've developed a sort of gag reflex to news like these. Just, shut down. But whatever. This is not something that keeps me awake. Not anymore.

Thursday, September 6, 2012

.

Rife with unwavering declarations
of loyalty to an invisible, dying, muse
I weave these damask feelings
into a tapestry of poetry.

I can only be sanguine for so long
before sibilants of melancholy succumb me
to these hallowed hollow grounds
where I unearth my conquered heart.



Tuesday, September 4, 2012

.


The swanning of her mind, I used to admire longingly
from my favourite metaphorical balcony
where I stood and wondered of how things came to be.

Her black banner streaming in the wind, bestirred me
and I knowingly allowed what was to come, unhinge me.
Unimpeded by the world, she was a law unto herself.

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Hello, September

I have a neighbour who sings a lot. Wordless songs. Or none that I could comprehend at least. Lengthy vibratos filled with emotion. Sometimes hauntingly sad, sometimes burning with bravado. You see, he sings the way a soprano does. That sort of music. Occasionally, a female voice accompanies him. The sky is impossibly clear & blue today. Finally, spring is officially here. He's greeting the birds and flowers I think. I've just went to throw open my window. The air is sweet. I am content right now.

Muse-ick

When life is breathed into the inanimate
the surrounding air, once still, made to dance
in exhales and inhales, music is borne.

Touch becomes art, rhythm lifeline
and the ears, a stairway to euphoria
where each note vibrates perfection.

The mastery of restrain
within the confines of delirium
    — Playing music.

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Love this.