Step lightly as you walk upon
The hallowed floors of knowledge
Knowledge doesn’t give itself up
To heavy soles
Poetry
It’s Hard To Be A Muslim
It’s hard to be a Muslim in these times
When random border checks have gotten cold
With camps and waterboarding on our minds
And neo-nazi haters walking bold
Like foreigners in lands we hold our own
We’re dust on maps dividing us apart
Unfounded fears turning hearts to stone
Impelling policy bereft of heart
We hear the names of prophets tossed in vain
By voices on the left and on the right
But can’t submit our intellect to gain
Admission to a Garden wrought from Light
It’s hard to be a Muslim till we see
That Muslim is just all we need to be
Life rolls on
Life and all within it roll
On like the waves in the sea
Up and down forever bound
For the shores of infinity
Set Freedom Free
Freedom’s fallen to her knees
And she’s got no strength to stand
When the voices of a nation
Fall like salt upon the sand
Muted by a call of hatred
Ringing all across the land
All her screams for gentle mercy
Stifled by a tyrant hand
Look around you, there are signs
In the flower and the tree
in the river and the sky
For an eye that wants to see
Come together, join as one
Ocean of humanity
Here and now, remove the shackles
Here and now: set Freedom free
Day and Night
Though the day chases night
Never brightens it quite
In the way that the night
Quenches day
Every worry and stress
Every pain becomes less
When you hear what the night
Has to say
Forgiveness
You’re angry at them all, and now
It feels like something deep within has died,
How could they do this to you
After all you do for them and all you’ve tried.
“Forgive, so God forgives you,” is
The chant repeated, and you’ve tried a lot,
But then you look at people
And reduce them to the gadgets that you’ve got:
It’s easy when a smartphone just
Goes dumb, you can exchange it for another,
But you can’t find replacements for
A parent, child, a sister or a brother.
You feel the world against you
Like a hammer coming down upon a nail
And then they say they’re sorry, but
You’re tired of the way they always fail.
Now all your love has withered in
The desert of your anger, you decide
There’s nothing left to give up but
The hardest thing to give up is your pride.
So hear the Friday caller’s call
To heed the words that drift upon his breath
And turn your eye upon yourself
And beg forgiveness now before your death.
Till there begins to swell a wave
Of Mercy from the fountain whence it springs
A wave that rolls toward the shores
Of faith with all the mercy Mercy brings.
It fills you with abilities
You thought were well beyond you all this time:
It’s easy to forgive when you
Have been forgiven any fault or crime.
Good deeds and sweet forgiveness wipe
Bad deeds and their effects away for good,
It’s what the angels do when they
Set out to carry orders as they should.
The Lord forgives, and so does his
Beloved Messenger forgive, and so
It is with his companions
And those who followed them: Forgive. Let go
That hearts adrift may join once more
And journey all together to the end
Where everything begins again,
Where mercies and forgivenesses descend.
Truth
Seek the truth for what it is
Not what you’d like it to be
Shake off time
Then time constrains
Time dies
Truth remains
Repartee
The words are formed and primed to do their dance
Upon the bones of honor in disgrace
You’ve strung your bow of tongue, awaiting chance
To send that verbal arrow nocked in place.
But then, just as you are about to fire
There falls a slowing hand upon your bow
Eliding tension for a reason higher
Than all the reasons you could ever know.
The arrow is dismantled word by word,
Replaced by disposition quite reversed:
An arsenal of patience undeterred
By thoughts seducing you to be your worst.
It is an act of courage to withhold
A poisoned arrow, be it cast in gold.
Parenting
I’ll let it slide because
I know you’ll learn someday
That all you said there was
Just all you didn’t say
A day on the prairie
Today:
just a day on the prairie
bounding
leaping
suddenly silently wary
slow down
amble on
by the brown
stroke of dawn
