It's Like Every Time I Close My Eyes, I See You

My friend had a dream about me last night.

She called from Morocco this morning to tell me about it. At least it is morning for me. Early. I was on the train on my way to work. I didn't hear the phone ring, but felt it vibrate in my pocket.
It is Friday afternoon in Morocco. Which means the baraka (blessings) of the day are palpable. She may be satiated from a traditional Friday couscous lunch. Or maybe not - she is pregnant, so who knows what she interested in eating these days.

The dream. She dreamt that I was getting both of my hands and both of my feet decorated with henna designs. She tells me this and then falls silent ( purposefully?). We both know what this "means," - marriage, a bride's preparation for a wedding. I say something to her like, well, God willing there will be good. I try to not to feed into her perchance for dreams and dream interpreting. Then she tells me, "It's like every time I close my eyes, I see you." She has been dreaming about me a lot lately.

Right now I know that I reciprocate the love all of the people who love me in Morocco. Which makes it all the more difficult when they ask the inevitable question, "When are you coming?" I say maybe in this month or that month - I don't know pray for me. I have been giving them dates that have come and passed without me traveling for half a year now. I no longer try to build up hope for any one involved.

My friend, the dreamer, wants me to come when she has the baby. Two other friends have had babies since I left and both had asked me if i would come when they had it, or if I would attend the sbu'a , the baby naming ceremony held one week after the birth where guests eat sheep slaughtered fresh for the occasion.

Before we hung up, with me speaking in loud Moroccan Arabic on the train, but my fellow passengers still a bit too sleepy to care , she mentioned the henna again. "You have to get your hands and feet decorated with henna when you come," she said.

Maybe I responded by saying, okay, or maybe I said insha'Allah. I can't remember even though it was just a few hours ago. I was just glad to have her accompany me there on the train during the morning commute.

It Was There I Learned How I was Not a Person, or Reading "A Mercy" by Toni Morrison

The other day I was at a local "Spanish" i.e. Central/South American grocery store in my neighborhood. I was simultaneously reading the back of tortilla packets and speaking to my dear friend on the cell phone tucked into the side of my headscarf. I moved from one brand of tortillas to the other unsatisfied because they had too many non-halal ingredients.

My phone conversation and my packet reading are both interrupted by a manager-type Hispanic guy who asks if i need some help. I reply in the negative. Then he says to me with a nice smile on his face, "We have pita-bread too ," and he points to the next aisle.. I suppose that for him, headscarf = pita bread.

I was hoping that my friend could hear the tortilla vs. pita conversation through the phone. I thought that it was just hilarious. I tell the nice man, that no, I actually want tortillas. And just then I find a still warm paper wrapped package of tortillas. It is a local , Chicago-made brand with only three ingredients: Corn flour, salt, and lime . Allahu Akbar.

In the next aisle, I quickly read the backs of sour cream containers. It became obvious to me that sour cream was a no-go. I keep looking but make a mental note to pick up some labna instead from the Palestinian store that I will pass on my way home.

Then, I start speaking to my friend about a book that I had just finished reading by Toni Morrison called A Mercy. I tell her that it is one of the best books written today, but like most true experiences, I cannot find the right words to put on it.

A Mercy is a historical novel about a place that is now called America. But the book takes place in 1690. There was no America then as there is now, although the word may have been in usage. There was a land of Native people and then boatloads of "others" forcing themselves or being forced upon the land. The "others" that we see in the book are poor European men and women who are brought to work as endentured servants on contracts that never seem to end, wealthy European slave-traders, Africans brought either directly from Africa or through the Caribbean to be slaves, and free Africans.

Morrison is skilled at letting us see how "up for grabs" everything was back then in terms of identity. She gives us an idea of the lives the people led in their old countries and then of the identities that they assumed or were made to assume once they made it to the "New World."

There is a great and powerful line in the novel where one of the African characters ponders how her language, dress,religion, everything, once she got to the New World, they were melded down into just black skin. That's it and that's all . Now she was seen to just possess black skin covering a hollowed out (but fertile of course) body.

And how many people in 2009 still feel that suffocation of just being black skin or headscarf? SubhanAllah.

Like all of Morrison's novels, A Mercy is about intelligent, strong women maneuvering around and surviving their interactions with men. Her characters are primarily intelligent, strong, Black women. And that is very refreshing for me as a Black woman who strives towards strength and intelligence God-willing.

I don't want to spoil the novel by saying anymore except READ IT. The copy that I checked out from the library has a sticker on the cover that says " African -American." That is supposed to show the genre of the book. All too often that also shows who will read the book and it would be a pity if only African Americans read A Mercy.

I don't think that there is any harm in sharing some lines from the end of the book with you here. They are powerful, but they do not give away any of what happens in the book. Morrison, the Nobel Prize winning author has one of the characters tell another character:

to be given dominion over another is a hard thing; to wrest dominion over another is a wrong thing; to give dominion of yourself to another is a wicked thing.

Separation is Natural

Picture this:

I am in the kitchen at the office finishing off a bottle of slightly over-priced fruit smoothie. I pour the contents into a glass and then pour water into the bottle in order to get out every drop of the mangoes, apples, etc. Then, as I triumphantly go to place the now clean bottle into the recycling bin, a phrase on the bottle jumps out at me " Separation is Natural."

If you had been there, you would have seen me noticeably taking a step back just at that moment. I read the bottle again , Separation is Natural. SubhanAllah.

They are trying to explain why you need to shake the bottle before you drink it. I don't know if i ever remember to shake the bottle, but I have not forgotten that phrase all day. It was as if some kind of salve was being rubbed into me as I read it. Yes, I said, almost smiling as I walked out of the kitchen - Separation is Natural. Thank you Allah (Subhanaka) for the message.

And then I came across this poem by W.S. Merwin, shall I not share it with you before we too are separated?

Separation

by W. S. Merwin

Your absence has gone through me

Like thread through a needle.

Everything I do is stitched with its color.

A Scent Stronger than the Odor of Musk

A few mornings ago I was reading a book that picked me up from the library entitled Hispano Arabic Poetry, it in were translations of poems done by the notable poets of Andalusia. They contained within them so much longing, sorrow, sadness, and desire that I kept telling myself to close the book as I indulged myself on the morning commute.

As I read the poets mourn the loss (forever?) of Islamic Cordoba , Seville, and Granada I told myself that at least Morocco is still there and I am not barred from setting my eyes on it by anything as substantial as political exile or the destruction of my entire civilization.

I know that Morocco is still there because two friends who have recently returned from there, came quickly to bestow upon me gifts. One came with containers full of fresh black Moroccan olives, raw honey, and an almond and sesame delicacy left over from their family's Ramadan stash. The other friend had written me from Rabat to ask what it was that i missed most from Morocco so that she could bring it back with her. "What I miss, "I wrote back to her, "you cannot bring with you." Sigh.

Now back in Chicago, she showed up at my place with a chunk of sweet scented musk-rock (misk). It exudes an intoxicating smell that I associate with men who wear white jillebas as they walk to the mosque. In Morocco sometimes they smear the rock on their skin so that even if one's head doesn't turn to look at them, one's other senses take full notice of their presence.

But I swear to you that the scent of Morocco that was rubbed onto my friend was stronger than that of the musk. She was aching for Morocco something bad and when I was in her presence I felt myself being pulled into emotions that I thought I had shed months ago as I "adjusted" and "reconciled" myself to life here in the US.

And then I got a visit from a friend that i had not seen in a little over a year. We had last hung out in Fez on a warm summer night. She thought it funny to see me in a winter coat having only know me in Morocco, where I never had a winter coat. She spent a few days with me, and said that hanging out with me was bringing up emotions and memories from her time in Morocco that she was still trying to sort out.

Early this morning, before the dawn prayer had even come in, I set out with her for the train that goes to the airport. After hugging her just before the train doors closed and waving goodbye to her now with the glass between us , I walked down the stairs of the train station and through the dark morning towards a mosque to say the dawn prayer. Half an hour later, I was walking down the street again, alone this time as if it were any other morning, and as if I were any other commuter untouched by the relationships I have made in a place more than 4,000 miles away that calls itself AlMaghreb.

It is far from me and can be rarely visited/ still its picture is the best image with me

I have been listening to this reading of a portion of the Dalail al Khayrat over and over again today. I know the voices of the people intimately, i know their names and their faces and the quirks of their personalities. They are in Morocco singing a centuries old poem about longing for the burial site of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him.

They are singing:

Oh you who is riding, making way towards Madina,

convey my greetings to the beloved Muhammad.

His excellent meadow is my hope and my desire,

and it contains the healing for my heart and its rest and repose.

So, if it is far from me and can be rarely visited

still its picture is the best image with me.

I run my eyes over the beauty of its meadow

and by it there is solace for my core, my secret and my heart.

Yesterday I listened over and over again to a little mp3 a friend sent me from her summer trip to Morocco. It was of the recitation of hadith before the Friday khutbah from a mosque in Rabat. On the mp3 hadith (sayings of the Blessed Prophet) were being read which tell people not to speak once the sermon starts, not even to tell their neighbor to be quiet.

The hadith are recited, almost sung, and in the tape you can hear the reactions of the women in the mosque sitting near my friend. They have heard these hadith recited over and over again, but I can still hear someone sigh, "Allah!" when the man says

"fa man laghaw fa la jumuahta lah, and the person who talks, has no friday prayer [i.e. their prayer is not accepted]"

It was my friend's first trip to Morocco and she has returned to Chicago stargazed, like someone who has just known love. She said that when she returned to university, everything seemed so familiar but it was she who was different, having been touched and changed by the generosity of Moroccans. SubhanAllah.

I am mostly quiet when she speaks.

The heartbroken do not give advice to those in love. Indeed, it should be forbidden for them to do so.

Everyday - a Little Conversation with God

Chicago has gone cold (already).



But I am more concerned with the spiritual forecast here. Somehow the coming of winter always lead me to question the "why" of living here. And then i happen upon a strong "because," and then i sigh, and tell myself to accept Allah's decree more, faster and with more believeability.



And then I think about a trip that I am supposed to take God-willing to the UK in a few weeks, to Oxford, and I want to get excited about it, I suppose that the UK is the closest thing to a Muslim country that I am going to get for a while. But I imagine a grey landscape, damp weather, being self-conscious about my American English, and not really know anyone there, etc, etc, etc. When will i ever become grateful? AstaghfiruLah al Adheem.



So this cold morning, first morning of wearing my Fall coat ( but thinking that i should get my winter coat cleaned soon), i opened up a book of poetry during my train ride to work.

The poem that spoke to me this morning was actually entitled "Work." It is a very long poem so I will share with you a few pieces (like candy).

Work

by Mary Oliver

I am a woman sixty year old and of no special courage.
Every day - a little conversation with God, or his envoy
the tall pine, or the grass-swimming cricket.
Everyday- I study the difference between water and stone.
Everyday- I stare at the world; I push the grass aside
and stare at the world.



...Later, the pollen shakes free.
Races this way and that way,
like a mist full of life, which it is.
We stand at the edge of the field, sneezing.
We praise God, or Nature, according to our determinations.



Then the grass curls or breaks, or we cut it.
What does it matter?
Do you think the grass is growing so wild and thick
for its own life?
Do you think the cutting is the ending, and not, also,
a beginning?

This is the world.



...Would it be be better to sit in silence?
To think everything, to feel everything, to say nothing?
This is the way of the orange gourd.
This is the habit of the rock in the river, over which the water pours
all night and all day.
But the nature of man is not the nature of silence.



...and what could be more comforting than to fold grief
like a blanket-
to fold anger like a blanket,
with neat corners-
to put them into a box of words?



....So I will write my poem, but I will leave room for the world.
I will write my poem tenderly adn simply, but
I will leave room for the wind combing the grass,
for the feather falling out fo the grouse's fan-tail,
and fluttering down, like a song.



... I will sing for the veil that never lifts.
I will sing for the veil that begins, once in a lifetime,
maybe, to lift.
I will sing for the rent in the veil.
I will sing for what is in front of the veil, the
floating light.
I will sing for what is behind the veil-
light, light, and more light.


This is the world, and this is the work of the world.

Now We Sing and Do Tiny Dances on the Kitchen Floor

Eid Mubarak - Eid Mubarak - Eid Mubarak

I'm trying to stay within the fasting frame of mind for a little bit of longer until i can complete the six days of Shawwal fast insha'Allah. But I found this poem by Robert Bly that I thought might resonate with how we feel on Eid morning.

_______

Waking from Sleep
by Robert Bly

Inside the veins there are navies setting forth,
Tiny explosions at the waterlines,
And seagulls weaving in the wind of the salty blood.

It is the morning. The country has slept the whole winter.
Window seats were covered with fur skins, the yard was full
Of stiff dogs, and hands that clumsily held heavy books.

Now we wake, and rise from bed, and eat breakfast!
Shouts rise from the harbor of the blood,
Mist, and masts rising, the knock of wooden tackle in the sunlight.

Now we sing, and do tiny dances on the kitchen floor.
Our whole body is like a harbor at dawn;
We know that our master has left us for the day.