When Baasha had done his hours of toil,
He walked from his shop through the dirt,
His hands bearing cuts from metal, and oil
Did streak down the sleeves of his shirt;
All traces of weakness fell from his face
To see by the door of his shack
His Rehmet in all her dignified grace
Just waiting for him to get back;
They shut out the twilight, bolted the door,
Then dined upon water and rice,
(The water in fact exceedingly more)
With salt as the singular spice;
Then Rehmet looked up at Baasha and drew
His blistery hands to her face,
To wash them in streams affectionate dew
That rolled down her cheeks in a race;
Ten thousand some miles away in the hour
When dawn is announced by a breeze,
There sitting beneath a clematis bower
Husna and her husband Aziz;
The question that Rehmet hid in her tears
And found not the words to advance,
Her sister in faith presented those fears
In much of the same circumstance;
If you were to die, and I to survive,
Or I were to die leaving you,
I worry the one remaining alive
May not really know what to do.
Aziz said no words, but dried off her tears,
Did Baasha, to Rehmet, the same;
The darkest of nights eventually nears
The dawn in celestial game.
– – – –
Your marriage is like a stake in the sand
That shifts with your every breath;
As long as you breathe, you must understand:
The thing that cements it is death;
He witnesses you as one, in His name,
As you bear the witnessing high,
Companions in life to always remain
Companions in life once you die.