Is this the brand of greatness we desire
Will all this madness make us great again
Dividing hearts and setting lives afire
And separating kids from parents when
It’s hard to find a job and wages slide
While markets are more fragile than before
It doesn’t matter what we claim beside
The daily plight of citizens galore
We’ve fractured every friendship we held dear
And stepped on wounds by elevating tyrants
We’ve seen this all before but now it’s clear
The dream autocracy has broken silence
It doesn’t matter much how great we’ll be
Once we have slaughtered our humanity
Poetry
Time for a Plan
In the face of forever,
One year, or one hundred,
All amount to the blink of an eye,
The span of a sigh,
Or the time that it takes
For time to go by.
So why then say that it is all over
When cancer claims her
Bullets ravage him
Conspiracy frames you
Or Facebook savages them.
I can see why:
It’s because
You are contained in time,
So it’s hard,
And as my brother says,
Harder to ignore it.
But you didn’t use to be
Contained.
You are built to live
Outside of time.
So, don’t say it is over.
Say instead: it has begun.
It will be over
When the One
Over it says it’s done.
May Yaqub’s sweet patience
Be your balm.
Stay calm
Let’s make a plan,
You, for your troubles,
And I, for mine.
Float
When a leaf begins to blow
It doesn’t know where it will go
But go it does until it comes to rest
So let the winds of destiny
Deliver you to where you’ll be
Cool river’s playmate or warm meadow’s guest
Journey On
As you ascend the rocky hill
Or swim the rushing stream
To get there (because getting there
Is often times the dream)
Just know: your destination
Decides the load you bear;
What matters more than where you go
Is rather how you fare.
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.
The Twenty-eighth of Ramadan
Hope is like the waning moon
That flees the starlit night
But only for returning soon
A floating silver scythe
To cut the ties of apathy
And cast aside despair
Let the ink of tawbah dye
This dark and silent satin sky
The Twenty-seventh of Ramadan
Sitting on a prayer rug,
I’m broken like a twig;
Got nothing left to show, Lord
Nothing there to give.
My heart is heavy, laden
With all this filth and grime,
Dripping with the sins that I have
Gathered over time.
Let it rain Your Nur
To wash away the dirt
This sinner has forgotten how
The touch of sin must hurt.
Sitting on a prayer rug,
Trying hard to cry,
Truth for me is buried deep,
Deep inside a lie.
The Twenty-sixth of Ramadan
Let not my Nabi
Turn away
Away from me
Upon that day
Allah, when shade
Is hard to find
When I would trade
The aggregate
Of all the pleasures
In my mind
But let him find me
In the throngs
And wave me over
To his side
Beneath the mantle of Mukhtar
Where in your endless mercy, Lord
Khalid might abide
The Twenty-fifth of Ramadan
First light rain:
I can’t help wonder
That every drop’s
Descending under
The careful watch
Of two angels.
Two!
The Twenty-fourth of Ramadan
If comes the Night of Power
And you are in its grasp
Your heart will soften in that hour
Till you weep at last
Seeking forgiveness
To be forgiven
Being forgiven
To forgive
Bless the tears
That let you live