Is it that we find mercy
When we show it to another
Or is that sweet discovery
The mercy altogether
Ramadan
9-7-1441
I see the sky when it’s blue
And I see it when it’s gray
But the seeing can’t be true
If in the hues of day
I see no gift from You
And I see it when it’s gray
But the seeing can’t be true
If in the hues of day
I see no gift from You
9-6-1441
Am I to spend my dwindling years
Wondering, Ya Rahman
At your sweet generosities
That span from dawn to dawn
Not knowing if I’m blundering
In my attempts at wondering
Teach me then how to wonder
That my leisure may not be in vain
Wondering, Ya Rahman
At your sweet generosities
That span from dawn to dawn
Not knowing if I’m blundering
In my attempts at wondering
Teach me then how to wonder
That my leisure may not be in vain
9-5-1441
Take all my fears of poverty
Of sickness, mediocrity
Of tyrannous authority
And gray unpopularity
Transform these fears, Ya Rabb
Under Your Mercy’s pressure
Into a fertile phobia
Of earning Your displeasure
Of sickness, mediocrity
Of tyrannous authority
And gray unpopularity
Transform these fears, Ya Rabb
Under Your Mercy’s pressure
Into a fertile phobia
Of earning Your displeasure
9-4-1441
This separation pains me so
A dagger pressed into my side
How fortunate are those who by
That patch of Paradise abide
A dagger pressed into my side
How fortunate are those who by
That patch of Paradise abide
9-3-1441
Let me feel Your Rahmah fall
As sunshine or as rain
Washing away all of all
Till only You remain
As sunshine or as rain
Washing away all of all
Till only You remain
9-2-1441
There was a time when all I knew
About Your love for me
Was in the sweet countenance of my mother
Then one night she returned to You
And with her all that sweetness too
And love: I thought I’d never know another
Then all my thoughts on love and loving
Came between Your Hands
So beautiful the manner you arrayed it
To fathom what beloved means
Can raise up from the sands
The fragments of a love that never made it
For years I held my intellect
A candle to the sun
A folly burned and sent where follies go
Until I came to see her face
In Your love for the one
Who loves me more than I can ever know
About Your love for me
Was in the sweet countenance of my mother
Then one night she returned to You
And with her all that sweetness too
And love: I thought I’d never know another
Then all my thoughts on love and loving
Came between Your Hands
So beautiful the manner you arrayed it
To fathom what beloved means
Can raise up from the sands
The fragments of a love that never made it
For years I held my intellect
A candle to the sun
A folly burned and sent where follies go
Until I came to see her face
In Your love for the one
Who loves me more than I can ever know
9-1-1441
This must be the first wave
Of Rahmah from You
That I woke up today
Realizing it’s true
I’m lesser compared
With the souls I have mocked
Much lesser in view
Of the path I have walked
Cast my heart on the hearth
Of this furnace divine
Let it be of the ones
That You choose to refine
Of Rahmah from You
That I woke up today
Realizing it’s true
I’m lesser compared
With the souls I have mocked
Much lesser in view
Of the path I have walked
Cast my heart on the hearth
Of this furnace divine
Let it be of the ones
That You choose to refine
If Darkness Be My Fate
If darkness be my fate then let me be
The darkness that had hosted my Nabi
When came the Word, a Light that set me free me
Yet let me in linger in that company
How blest the darkness in a silent cave
That welcomes in the Nūr upon a slave
The Twenty-ninth of Ramadan
O Allah, help me. Help me get
To where that fountain bursts;
And when I get there Allah, let
Me quench my burning thirst
By him whose hands were raised for me,
O Allah, let me meet
Your Mukhtar. Khalid longs to be
Beside his blessed feet.