Khalid Mukhtar

Word, like wind, cuts through you / Withers all but true you

Rūmān

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To reach the Garden
We must brave
A terrible inversion

What is, is not
What is not, is
And every such diversion

Until a bough
Comes offering
Rūmān explaining why

This heavenly
Inversion as
We swallow crimson sky

All That’s Beautiful

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You fill your heart up to your eyes
With all that’s beautiful
Lagoon and ocean, hill and rolling greens
With loving braces, toddler cries
Yes, all that’s beautiful
The colors and the fragrances of scenes

But khalid, know this beauty can
Like all that’s beautiful
Just float away upon a summer breeze
That leaves a beauty-loving man
And all that’s beautiful
Alone and ragged, down upon his knees

If love you must, then love you should
Of all that’s beautiful
The best of all creation, love him best
For lake and hill and toddler will
Like all that’s beautiful
Forsake you when you take the final test

Allahuma salli ‘ala Muhammad

Storm

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Heed the storm that knowledge wages
When the form of Āṣif rages
Fetching what is needed at
The constant speed of Nūr

Name

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The م in the name of Muhammad
‎Is how lips come together like hearts

‎The ح in the name of Muhammad
‎May the hamd be what from them departs

‎The م comes again to remind you
‎That a kiss is built into his name

‎And the د at the end: may it find you
‎In the deen his existence became

Thaw

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Here’s the lake of all I’ve done
Worn my weary heart away
Blow, O wind and shine, O sun
Melt each icy part away

Sin is like the wave that goes
On and on and then some more
Compass me, O One who knows
Still my heart and be my shore

Heat

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The fire could not touch Ibrahim
And Yunus was safe from it too
The fire within and the water without
Are nothing when Nūr is with you

Don’t Stop Now

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The faster you go
The higher you fly
The harder you hit
The longer you die

The harder you brake
The faster you fall
The longer you run
The higher the call

Al-Baseer

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To the all-encompassing Seer
Who every negligibility sees:
The wake of a supernova can’t eclipse
What follows a trifling sneeze

Drink

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The Rabb knows how He brings about
A change in every thing
How from the fount of Hā Mīm ‘Ayn
Sīn Qāf these verses spring

Now don’t you break the order in
What’s there to be preserved
But marvel at what thrives beyond
The sound of flapping wing

And know that all you know is never
Yours more than you are
So drink from all the goodness Hā
Mīm ‘Ayn Sīn Qāf may bring

Rolling

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I’ve heard there is
No going back
For time and rivers, you

Can wind about
To make your way
A bit like rivers do

To get to where no shadows fall
And superfluity is all

Where time is dead
And _and_ is bred
Until you’re never through