While we go about living our daily lives, caught up in the speed and realness of each moment, an occasional “oh my Allah!” moment interrupts, reminding us to step back and reassess our situation. Reality dawns upon us, and we suddenly find ourselves at a loss of hope because of our sins.

All of this is due to our choosing to live in the moment instead of living for this moment and all the rest. We find ourselves being lackadaisical and insincere when we want to repent. We begin to lose faith in Allah and His decree. We gradually slack off in our good deeds, and then finally come to the dismal conclusion that we’ve lurked too far in sins to return to guidance.

For those of us who share these same sentiments, here’s a divine message of hope and relief from our Master:

“‏واني لغفار لمن تاب وءامن وعمل صالحا ثم اهتدى”

“And indeed, I am the perpetual forgiver to whoever repented, had faith, and performed a righteous deed. Then he is guided.” (Surah Ţāhā 20:82).

In this one verse, we find so many lessons that have the potential to lift us from our prison of deviance and help us find the key to forgiveness. We only need to take heed.

When beginning the verse, Allah uses two forms of emphasis to show the importance of what He is about to say. He firstly uses inna (إنّ), which essentially means “most definitely, without a doubt!” He then uses lām al-ta’kīd (لام التأكيد), which conveys a similar meaning of inna (إنّ) and further emphasizes the ensuing message.

Allah then refers to Himself as Ghaffār (غفّار). Grammatically, Ghaffār (غفّار) is a hyperbolized noun, which denotes that Allah is perpetually and constantly forgiving and looking over faults. In the study of Qur’ānic rhetoric (balāghah), the use of a verb instead of a noun usually denotes an action which will eventually come to rest and subside. But when a word is used as a noun instead of as a verb, then it means it is constantly happening without any end. We sometimes forgive and we sometimes forget, but Allah forgives and forgives and forgives. The stem of His mercy is like water whose flow does not ebb.

Immediately after Allah mentions He is Ghaffār (غفّار), He explains who are eligible for His forgiveness: tāb (تاب – the one who has sincerely repented), āman (آمن – the one who believed), and lastly, ‘amal (عمل – performed an act of good). Allah finishes the verse by saying those are the ones who are guided.

In summary, Allah’s mercy is so vast that He is capable of forgiving us no matter how much we may have sinned. Though we keep promising to Him that we’ll stop and yet persist in our vain desires, Allah (glorified and exalted be He) continues to shower us with his forgiveness. In fact, He wants us to repent even if we later end up committing that same sin again! Even if we had faith in Allah one day, and the next day it sort of faded out, Allah keeps on forgiving us. Even if we didn’t perform that many deeds, Allah continues to forgive us. At the end of the day, when we haphazardly demonstrate our insincere repentance, try to believe with our weak faith, and act with barely any good deeds, Allah still puts us on the path of guidance, subhānAllāh (glory be to Allah).

This is the essence of Allah being Ghaffār (غفّار) to us.

To add to this amazement, Allah mentioned the tribe of Isra’īl before this verse. In the Qur’ān, Allah dedicates most of the stories of revelation to them, their dealings with Musa, and the numerous crimes they committed. Besides Fir’awn and those like him, not a single nation’s mistakes are mentioned more than the tribe of Isra’īl. Even with a flawed record such as theirs, Allah mentioned this verse, demonstrating to us His mercy and how it was even shown to them!

Whether we may know it or not, Allah is more merciful to us than anybody else, even more so than our own loving mothers. When we made mistakes as children, our mothers smiled and kept giving us chance after chance. Allah’s capacity for forgiveness does not even compare. As long as we request, beg, and ask of Him continuously and constantly, we will always be under Allah’s guidance. All we have to do then, is try.
May Allah give us the ability to be better Muslims who will serve His religion in whatever capacity we can. May He give us the ability to turn to Him with sincere repentance, a strong heart devoted to loving and believing in Him, and actions which benefit us in the Hereafter. Āmīn.

Surraya uncrossed her feet and then crossed them again. She shoved her hands deeper into her pockets, her itchy freezing fingers in search of some warmth. Gosh, it was cold, she thought. She was sitting in the doctor’s office, waiting for her turn. Her throat wasn’t getting any better, and after a week of taking cough syrup, she was back with an even worse case of strep throat. These bloody doctors don’t care about a thing except their bank accounts, she fumed, as she rolled her eyes and slumped back in her chair. She had a sudden urge to strangle someone with a stethoscope.

Suddenly Amira walked into the waiting room and Surraya’s eyes widened. She watched as her neighbour booked her name at the reception desk and came to sit in an empty chair across the room. Surraya’s gaze ran down from Amira’s crumbled dupatta, to her ugly cotton clothes with the ancient design, to the flip flops on her feet. Her dark unkempt black hair was playing hide and seek, with curls popping out from beneath the cloth on her head. There were horrible black bags under her eyes. Her face looked worn and exhausted, as though her affair with sleep had ended years ago. Surraya’s scrutinizing study came down to pause at her neighbor’s bulging belly. She’d heard enough about Amira to know what kind of person she was.

Her husband worked all day, brought money home, and took the kids out on weekends. She used to watch them on Saturday afternoons from her living room window. They lived in the huge bungalow across from her, with the rose bushes and vegetable patch. She had what Surraya believed to be the perfect life, with everything a woman could ask for. Yet the woman always looked sad and depressed, messy and weak. She avoided conversation and if someone did happen to talk to her, she would just snap back or not even reply. People in the community often talked about her; some even said she was ‘a bit in the head’. At a mosque gathering, Naseem the tailor had shared that she had gone round to Amira’s house the day before. She had found the kitchen to be filled with dirty dishes and saw that the kids were in front of the telly, still in their pyjamas. They told her that their mother was asleep upstairs. “It was disgraceful!” she said, her eyes filled with disgust. “The lady was sleeping through the afternoon, she had probably missed her prayers too!” Saeeda, the madrassah teacher, had quickly interjected saying how Amira didn’t even come to the Tajweed classes. She stopped coming after the first few days, she told everyone else disapprovingly. Surraya had listened to all the talk, and for the remainder of that evening, they had giggled, laughed, made up all sorts of stories, and then left after praying salah.

Surraya’s thoughts were interrupted by the entrance of a young handsome man who walked into the waiting room and came and sat next to Amira. He pocketed the car keys he’d been holding and leaned forward to say something to her. She whispered something back and then lifted her head to look up at him. Surraya had never seen this man before and instantly her heart was racing. Could this be what it looked like? She couldn’t believe it! The young man touched Amira’s hand, and with the other hand, he wiped the tears slowly falling from her eyes. Surraya’s eyes darted from the clutching hands to the pregnant belly and she heard herself gasp. Ya Allah.

***

Opposite Surraya, Amira sat with her brother, Malik, and angrily swept away the tears that were leaking from her already swollen and puffy eyes. Her body hurt, some from the bruises and scars her husband had gifted her the night before, and some from the pain and loneliness that was tearing her heart apart. Her skin condition wasn’t getting any better, forcing her to remain in old cotton dresses. She missed the days when she could wear anything from her wardrobe, from the sequined tops to the embroidered skirts. But now, they were brutal enemies to her. They burnt her skin and caused blazing forest fires to rage constantly throughout her body. Doctors had said it was a serious skin condition. She touched her swollen tummy, thinking about the innocence that lay inside, and suddenly her eyes were stung with fresh tears once more. How was she going to go through this again? She thought of her other three children, her precious little ones, and her mind raced to the horror and discomfort they witnessed a few times already. Their father’s angry beating and their mother’s heart-wrenching screams. Today, she had finally plucked up the courage to ring her brother who had flown in from Ireland. She was terrified about what her husband would do when he found out. She felt Malik squeeze her hand and she gripped onto it.

“It’s all going to be okay, Amira. Please don’t cry,” he whispered. The sight of his sister in so much pain was causing his blood to boil with rage and his anger to dance furiously in his body. He couldn’t wait to get his fingers round the throat of his brother-in-law, but his sister came first. So he sat there, wiping the tears slowly falling from her eyes.

Amira nodded, trying to calm herself. She kept her gaze lowered, and stared at her toes. She was terrified to look up and meet Surraya’s eyes. In her head, she could hear the sniggers, the whispered talk, and the stories she knew people published on living room walls and stolid park benches.

“All right, everyone. Let’s recite Surah Al-Asr before we finish class,” I announced to thirteen pairs of brown eyes staring up at me. In unison, the chorus of excited third-graders began to read the Surah. One little girl in a puffy white coat and gauzy blue hijab leapt up in excitement, waving her hands grandiosely as she recited the Surah. The boy sitting next to her saw this as a challenge; grinning, he increased his voice three octaves to try and overshadow her. By the time the Surah was over, their voices boomed throughout the masjid hall.

This was the essence of purity and beauty: the sound of joyful kids reciting the words of the Qur’an. It never failed to drown out worried thoughts that might have been preoccupying my mind before.

As class ended, the kids tramped out of the masjid, each clutching the arks they had colored after learning about the story of Prophet Nuh (may Allah’s peace be upon him). I stayed where I was, wearily resting my head on the graffiti-covered wooden table as the realities of the upcoming week slowly came back to me.

The night before, I had made a list of what I had to do in the next few days. College applications clamored for my attention, scholarship essays needed to be written, and then there was the daily routine of chemistry labs, English presentations, and calculus exams.

Everybody has weeks where they’re overwhelmed with work and lose all notion of time. This was mine. Hours melted into days and days rapidly deteriorated into weeks as I worked, worked, worked, and worked. The sands of time were running out of very my fingers as deadlines approached and the calmness of my mind disintegrated.

“Asalaamu ‘alaikum.” Another teacher’s friendly greeting roused me from my self-induced stupor of self-pity and panic.

“Wa ‘alaikumus salaam. I was actually going to come talk to you,” I answered slowly, “I won’t be able to teach next Sunday because I have two college applications due on Monday. I’ll get someone to cover for me, Insha’Allah. Is that okay?”

She shook her head, declaring emphatically, “No, you have to come next Sunday.”

I stared at her for a minute, unsure if she was serious. I had a legitimate reason! Didn’t she know that next week could possibly determine my future, while Sunday school would come again and again?

Unnerved by her refusal, I looked around the room, trying to regain my composure. The messy table with strewn crayons and sprawled books didn’t help, except to remind me of the unfinished work awaiting me at home.

“But…but, I have to,” I stuttered, starting to ramble. “My application is due on Monday and I can’t get any of it done before.”

She looked at me for a minute with a mother’s eyes.

“You think that if you skip class next week and stay at home, you’ll get more work done. But if you come to class, Allah will give you more barakah. You might have four fewer hours to do your work, but Insha’Allah, your work will be even more successful because you took the time to remember Allah and teach about Islam.”

Her brutally honest words made me feel instantly ashamed as it forced me to reevaluate my work and so-called ‘study habits’.

Wasn’t it true that when I had homework or cleaning or some other overbearing obligation, I pushed Islam off to a last priority? The sister’s words made me remember the time I stayed up all night studying for a chemistry midterm and put aside reading Qur’an because I hadn’t had time. There was the day I skipped hadith class because I had three essays to write and I thought I could just go again next week. How often had I put Islamic learning or reading Qur’an last on my to-do lists? I thought I was being more efficient, but I was really preventing barakah and the blessings of Allah from entering into my life.

Most people forget about reading Qur’an or learning new ahadith when they become very busy and stressed. The truth is that this is the time that we should remember Allah the most, for He is the one who makes our efforts successful and eases our trials. Barakah allows us to achieve more with few resources, complete a lot when we are most pressed for time, and make our efforts successful.

After all, Allah is Al-Mu’tee (The Giver), Al-Baasit (The Extender), and Ar-Razzaq (The Provider). Without Him, all of our efforts would be fruitless. As it says in the Qur’an, “And if any one puts his trust in Allah, sufficient is Allah for him. For Allah will surely accomplish his purpose” (Surah Al-Talaq 65:3).

Maybe the kids weren’t the only ones who needed to recite Surah Al-Asr.

Home. Where is home? I thought of this and only then was I faced with the inevitable.

“We’re going to move by the end of the year.” My father’s sudden words temporarily silenced me. I paused for a moment, unsure of what to say or how to feel.

“Do I have a choice?” I asked, afraid of what I knew he was going to say.

“No,” he said quietly. He sensed my pain. He’s seen this look on my face before. But he too, had no choice.

I tried to comfort myself, but the recurring thought of moving over 1,400 miles away from my closest friends and family wasn’t helping. I reminisced on the last time I moved, which was four long years ago. How did I handle that? Not well. My eyes began to water as I recollected thoughts of suicide, hopelessness, and fear. Four years ago, I was hardly a practicing Muslim; I was a naïve thirteen-year-old completely and utterly lost in this world. I wasn’t too keen on staying with my previous circle of friends, but it was the abrupt change and fear of the unknown future that frightened me. I was afraid of leaving what I assumed to be my home.

“Where is home?” I remember asking myself.

“Home is Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,” I answered without a second thought. Internally, I was dissatisfied with that answer, and I sought further reasoning.

“Why?”

“Because it’s where I spent my childhood.” 

I left it at that. But I knew I didn’t belong there. Spiritually, I was still searching for the answer.

So I ask myself, now, four years later: “Where is home?”

Before I can answer “Home is Springfield, Virginia”, a part of me takes a step back – a step back from the present moment, from this temporary, petty term of our existence. I had to think about this in terms of my deen, in terms of the totality of my life. There is a place I seek, something I long for. No, Some One. I long for the closeness to my Lord. I long for spiritual peace from the only Source of Peace. It was then that I realize that the only comfort is with the Source of Comfort Himself.

I was reminded of a few ahadith I heard recently in a lecture:

The Prophet Muhammad (may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him) said, ”By Him in Whose Hands my life is, everybody will recognize his dwelling in Paradise better than he recognizes his dwelling in this world” [Bukhari]. He (may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him) also said, “Live in this world as (if you are) a wayfarer or a stranger” [Bukhari, Tirmidhi].

I sighed, relieved. I had an answer. We are all just on our journey home. This life is just one thing: a journey. I could live in Saudi Arabia, I could live in Virginia, but none of those were the right places. There is only one objective: to please Allah. There is only one destination: a home, promised to those who sincerely struggle to please their Lord. A home that is light years further than 1,400 miles.

“O mankind, indeed you are laboring toward your Lord with [great] exertion and will meet it” (Surah Al-Inshiqāq 84:6).

As the well-known saying goes, ‘Home is where the heart is’. I know now that my heart solely belongs to Allah. My home is in His Grace, and my home is in Jannah, Insha’Allah.

May Allah accept our efforts and make us among those whose true home awaits them in Jannah. Ameen.

Become one with the earth.
Lay upon the dirt from which you came.
Sinking, melting,
Streaming down the crevices
Cracks, slipping further.
We return to the earth, don’t we?
Go, return to your Lord.
Creator.
Guardian.

Let the sun wash over your skin.
Bask in the beams of mercy,
A gift from your Lord
Calling to you
Pray
Beg
Bathe in the sheets of noor
Filling every pore, hole, void,
With longing
To glide along the bridges threading from sky to earth.

Crystal droplets, dancing
Sloshing, swishing
Flowing down the banks
Bubbling, gurgling
Rushing foam
A gift to your parched throat.
Sliding down the tunnel
Moistening your cracked lips.

Rustling blades of grass
Crushed against your body
Crumpled, springy
Dewdrops, beads resting atop these towers,
Creased, crunched
Rustling
Waving in the breeze.

Timeless silence.
Can you paint with the colors of the wind?
Wavering
Swaying
Gliding
Persuasive gusts of incessant beauty.

Endless blue
Stretching across the heavens
Flexing to match the mold of the sky
Soft to the touch, clouds
Scattered, peppered,
Dotting the skies of great depth.

A crack, a hiss
The sound of a shattered soul
Pain, loss,
Spreading, filling every gap.
Bursting at the seams of gentle skins.

Covering
Smothering
Begging to escape
To leave your crushed body
Impossible, inescapable,
Leaking from the ducts that corner the gateways to your soul
Streaming down your face
Dripping into the ground
Soaking the earth.
Every drop
Hungry, ravenous
To leech away the pain.

Become one with the earth
Lay upon the dirt from which you came
Sinking, melting,
Streaming down the crevices
Cracks, slipping further
Little by little, bit at a time
Slowly
Go, return to your Lord.

There are times in life which every human being capable of emotion is able to relate to. A moment where you feel the power of utter vulnerability, when the spiderwebs of familiarity you have woven around you over the course of years – even decades – are ripped away, when you feel like one of the hollow sea shells drifting along the foamy seas…

There are times when every morsel of your body yearns to melt into the earth, to vanish completely. When you want to run away so nobody can ever find you again.

Allah (Glorified and Exalted be He) says that man was created weak, that we need to have a Lord to return to in these times of plight.

Every human is subject to these moments of hopelessness. The solution then, is to return to Allah, to yearn and ask for His Mercy.

Because of course, ‘in the remembrance of Allah do the hearts find rest’ (Surah Ar-Ra’d 13:28).

She was dragged mercilessly to the balcony, clutching her black plastic trash bag close to her side as if her life depended on it. The dusty, mosquito-infested balcony was perhaps two feet wide, five feet long. She stared aimlessly into the crowded and polluted city of Dhaka, Bangladesh, a woman in her early twenties. The balcony door was slammed shut and locked. Tears rolled down her face as she tightened her scarf insecurely, her hands shaking. The little ones banged the balcony door, taunting and jeering.

***

Earlier that day, she was expecting to depart to her home village, from where she was hired a few months before. As she was escorted to a rickety rickshaw, my aunt noticed her bag was unusually heavy, things inside of it clanking together. Frankly, servant girls barely have enough clothes to last them two or three days, so based on that suspicion, my aunt demanded to check her plastic trash bag. After much resistance from the poor woman’s end, it was discovered that she had stolen a number of household items. The loot consisted of a few plastic toys, red onions, cilantros, and a few other items. Upon estimation, it amounted to perhaps two or three American dollars.

News spread throughout the entire building that a servant had committed thievery. For a country so corrupted, the reaction to petty theft was rather ironic. Everyone began to give their input on the punishment. The girl was cornered in the servants’ headquarters, an unfurnished, barren rock-floored room. Finally, my aunt arrived with a pair of scissors. The girl gasped, her tears and sweat fusing down her face. I was utterly confused, unsure as to what could be done with those scissors.

The servant dropped to her knees, pleading and begging for her dear life. Her scarf was loosened as her long hair tumbled towards the ground. They were intending to cut her hair. I still could not follow along with this foreign form of punishment.

It was then explained to me that her hair was a means of beauty. For a servant girl, that was the only ticket to marriage as she had no wealth or lineage. Observing her tear-stricken face, her thin and weak knees shaking, I squirmed and looked away. I heard my mother whisper a plea on behalf of the girl. Perhaps my aunt did not want to create a scene in front of us, visitors from halfway across the world. Perhaps the girl had learned her lesson. Whatever the reason, my aunt eventually dropped the scissors and called the girl’s family to immediately pick her up.

Suddenly, all of my challenges and tribulations seemed minuscule in comparison. It was a reality check; a reminder to not only be grateful for all of my materialistic possessions, but for the intangible traits of honor and dignity as well; a reason to express modesty and humbleness at all times. Who is it to say that I could not have been in her shoes? It was only through necessity and desperation that she had committed this misdeed, if her actions can even be called that.

It was sad for me to witness this incident, especially since I have always only heard of the people of Bangladesh being associated with their impeccable hospitality and fish curry. I then realized that much of this behavior was in fact reflective of a larger global phenomenon of our perpetually developing world, where there has arisen an inevitable imbalance on the scale of social structure both domestically and internationally. This disparity has caused various forms of racism and discrimination to emerge and erupt on many fronts, including class, skin color, culture, and tradition. This dissonance has trickled down to the local and everyday level in many places, including Bangladesh, and has unfortunately led many people to fall sway to blatant racism and discrimination.

The Prophet Muhammad (may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him) once said, “A white (person) has no superiority over a black (person) nor a black (person) has any superiority over a white (person) except by piety and good action” (Tirmidhi). Perhaps it’s time for all of us, especially for those of us who have been deafened and blinded by our own egotistical lifestyles for too long, to actively speak out and work against acts of discrimination everywhere, blatant or otherwise.

***

Upon returning home, the stacks of school books and endless work documents were just as I had left them, untouched. However, with this fresh perspective in mind, the tasks appeared smaller. I pushed in my chair, opened the first task at hand, and said, “Alhamdulillah.”

What went through her mind as she was then marched to the balcony, what became of her thereafter, I still cannot help but wonder. Nonetheless, I pray that she has found solace and honor wherever she may reside.

As a young girl, I developed an overzealous fascination with outer space. The balance of the blazing stars astounded me – especially as they contrasted against the composed and appeasing moon. When I was ten years old, my mother gifted me with a miniature telescope which I treasured whole-heartedly. I loved everything about it: its fluorescent yellow coloring and accented lines of charcoal grey, its accompanying encyclopedia containing pages and pages decorated with the images of constellations that I one day hoped to locate, but most of all that each time I would peer through the narrowed eyepiece I would see the startling chasm of earth and sky.

I recall the copious amount of time I spent sitting by my windowsill contriving a planetarium within the confinements of my own mind, marveling at the thought of distant places as I tethered together the images of planets, stars, moons, and asteroids far far away. It was confounding to think that I, one girl, was but a single being in the cluster of not only people but both the world of the animate and inanimate. I existed as a one, yet connected to so many. I was lost in space and peculiarly enough, that’s just the way I liked it.

But, today is different. You see, through the years I’ve struggled to find my footing in a world blasting with the loud murmur of assent for egocentrism. A world where we are force-fed the idea that self-indulgence should be our primary intent for any and all actions. A place riddled with the belief that the world ceases to exits past our fingertips – which my ten-year-old self would emphatically disagree with. Pride takes refuge in our hearts as we strive to acclimate our souls in a place, a world, which was not meant to last forever. The arenas of our minds and hearts have become pervaded with the conviction that looking out for our wants and needs is the sure path to untarnished success.

Questions heave in my chest and I’m flustered. Why have we forgotten about our hungry neighbors and those who suffer from ailments and diseases residing in hospitals? How could we forget those who are lying on streets or under bridges with nothing more than makeshift cardboard beds? When did we become so pretentious that self-assurance itself has become merely a contention for further competition? Why have we forgotten that a vast and yielding world exists outside our doors? And have we forgotten our origin story, our humble beginnings?

I keep having this reoccurring vision of battling against my very self as I’m being swallowed into the abyss of my ego. For whenever I find myself weak and forgetful of who I am, I write recklessly in my journal. I always pen the same paragraph, over and over again.

I’d like to skip the pleasantries and lay it all on the line. I would like to declare that I am a speck. I am a single speck. I am a single servant whose entire existence has been molded from a clot of blood. My feet cling to Earth unrelentingly and the air I breathe statically charges me. The blood flowing through my veins warms me and the fire of faith fuels my sprit. I have Him (subhana wa ta’ala) to thank and I solely worship and obey Him (subhana wa ta’la).

We should be asking ourselves, what have we contributed to the betterment of the world? Scratch that. We should be asking ourselves, what we have contributed towards the betterment of the world, sincerely for the sake of Allah? As Muslims we are naturally fitted to be a social activists. We have a role to fulfill and a responsibility to shoulder. With all of the resources at our disposal and means at our fingertips, no excuse is justifiable.

Half the battle is simply bursting the bubble of our intrinsically driven lives and reminding ourselves that we have gifts to share with the world, especially those who desperately need them. Not to inch too close to a cliché, but it’s a great big world out there and you don’t need to peer into a telescope to realize that. Thus, I lay my fluttering eyelashes to rest, send myself to that planetarium buried deep in my mind and recall the words of Edward Everett Hale. “I am only one; but still I am one. I cannot do everything; but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do”.

I had just dropped my sisters off at madrassah – the mosque school – and was heading home. The sun was finally calling it a day, decorating the sky with a glorious mix of orange and pink. It was raining lightly, my windscreen wipers wiping tiny specks of water away as I drove on. I watched as young children walked towards the madrassah, dressed in small abayas and thobes, carrying their bags and clutching Qur’ans tightly to their chests.

For them it was another evening to understand God’s message.

Another evening of embracing this beautiful gift of Islam.

It made me smile.

My phone vibrated on the passenger seat next to me, announcing a text message. With one hand on the steering wheel, I reached for it and instantly heard my mother’s voice echo in my head. “Be careful when you’re driving. Both hands on the wheel, okay? Accidents happen in seconds, remember?” I left my phone untouched and placed both hands on the wheel. “Okay, mum! Happy now?” I said to the silence in my car, slightly annoyed at the fact that even though she wasn’t there, her words were.

I slowed down as a speed hump appeared in the middle of a road and then I noticed an old woman with a shopper trolley standing at the side waiting to cross. I waved her past. Very slowly, she gripped her shopper and stepped onto the road. She was short and weak, her shiny white hair covered with a red knitted hat. Just before she reached the other side, she stopped, lifted a hand and waved at me, smiling. My headlights shone in her face highlighting the piercing blue of her eyes and the deep set of wrinkles around them. I waved back. She lifted her other hand, steadying her shopper with the first and mouthed a thank you.

And then her smile vanished.

Her head fell back as her waving hand shot towards her chest. Her shopper clattered to the floor. Her eyes widened with shock. She was clutching her chest with both hands. I blinked, lifted up the hand break and rushed out of the car. I ran towards her as she fell to the ground. Her eyes were rolling back, something was dribbling out of her mouth. Her chest rose. I waited for it to fall, but it never did. And then, she went still.

Very still.

I felt my insides freeze as I remembered where I’d seen this before. Blood rapidly rushed to my head. I heard loud pounding in my ears as people crowded around us. I knelt down by the old lady. What was I supposed to do? I knew absolutely nothing about her. Who was she? Someone shouted something about an ambulance. A woman screamed. I felt strong hands gripping me, pulling me up. Someone yanked me forward. I heard horns, the screech of brakes and then I felt the world tilt as the sound of shrieking sirens invaded the air.

“Sister? Sister, are you okay?” I looked up.

It was a brother, his face etched with concern, his eyes running back to the ambulance that had just arrived. Something within me rose as my throat tightened. I managed a nod.

“She’s gone. I saw her. I saw her walking across the road and she was waving. They’re taking her in.” His disorganised words tumbled out of him; I didn’t know what to say. I watched as the stretcher was lifted, as paramedics rushed around, and as the crowd of people began to thin as everyone went on their own way. I wondered about the phone that would shortly ring in an unknown household, breaking the peaceful silence and announcing the presence of death. How many lives would it affect and shatter?

“Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi rajioon.” I heard myself whisper.

To God we belong and to Him we shall return.

On the way home, my thoughts circled around what had happened to that poor woman. One second she was waving at me and the next second she was holding her chest like it was a lifeline. It was less than a second. An instance. And then death had claimed her. That was all it took. An instance. What had passed through her in that moment? Had she known the angels of death had arrived?

The loud sound of my phone ringing broke into my thoughts. It was my mum.

“Hurry home, where are you?” she asked, her voice heavy with excitement. “Your uncle just phoned that your aunt has given birth to a baby girl. Oh, gosh! He was so close to tears. Hurry up, we’re on our way to the hospital,” she said and quickly hung up. I realized I had forgotten all about my aunt and the new baby.

I was hurrying home to the arrival of a birth after witnessing a death. The very same hospital, that would consume that old woman’s body and become a grieving ground for her family, would be a beacon of light and hope as we celebrated the warm welcome of an innocent baby girl. The reality of it shocked me – when it shouldn’t have. We all know we’ll be leaving one day, don’t we? Yet it still grips us on the insides and claws its way around. We know nothing here is everlasting, yet we grip on tightly, fists bent tight, knuckles turning white. In one second it would all come crashing down, yet it’s a forgotten reality.

Life and death. They were so close, yet so far apart. So similar in their ways of changing lives and teaching lessons, of triggering emotions and clearing the specks of dust from our eyes, enabling us to see clearly.

Tonight, a few miles away someone would be grieving over an absence, whilst under our roof we would be celebrating a presence.

I know a woman who sells perfume,
and keeps me apprized of the richest scents in bloom.
Whenever I find my fragrances nearly finished,
I peer into her shop window before the store hours diminish.
Ever ready is she with scents that enliven the air:
Freesia, Jasmine, Vanilla, and Pear.
Finally, when I manage to tear myself away,
the fragrances linger upon me, far from decay.

I then see a man parting from a blacksmith marked,
It seemed on his journey home he embarked,
In a state unfit, unclean and utterly marred,
By the remnants of the burnt metal, almost scarred.
Stumbled did he onto the sidewalk coughing,
Incited by the ash and soot he’d been inhaling.
Shaking hands with passersby,
Who wiped their hands clean on the sly.

When I got home, I realized that it saddened me to see,
That this man’s merchant does not do for him what mine does for me.

The Prophet Muhammad (may Allah’s peace and blessings upon him) said: “A good friend and a bad friend are like a perfume-seller and a blacksmith: The perfume-seller might give you some perfume as a gift, or you might buy some from him, or at least you might smell its fragrance. As for the blacksmith, he might singe your clothes, and at the very least you will breathe in the fumes of the furnace” (Sahih al-Bukhari and Muslim).

Sometimes we think that just because there is light everything is clear. We fail to see the shades. We are blind to the shadows of their stories.

On one of your semi-solitary strolls along the river of cement, you encounter a palace whose only openings are windows.

You reach for a broad bright window and swing it open. There, you see a very respectable-looking man. Driven by curiosity, you observe him with his friends, his boss and his co-workers.

Light seems to be radiating from all around him. So courteous, so lively, so ready to help everyone with prompt generosity, you need not even ask and he will deliver. He smiles at every poor or humble stranger he meets; every word of his resounds as a lesson in wisdom. He’s the one to trust even if you commit a grave mistake. He’d never hold grudges; he would always ready be ready to forgive.

What a noble man! What a great example to follow! Let’s not disturb him further. You gently close the bright window and move to another one in search for an entrance to this spellbinding palace.

While searching, you come across a desperately small little window shrouded by dust and a strange black, dense liquid. Your hands hesitantly reach to pry it open, but every effort, every attempt results in a series of vain efforts. Defeated, you resort to simply look through the obscure opening.

Visibility and darkness blink at you at the rhythm of the hearts of three young brothers playing together. Their soft laughter lights up the house, wiping away your thoughts of the dirty window. What a warm atmosphere – a happy family for sure.

The clock strikes ten.

The faces of the kids turn pale and the games freeze. They glance at each other expectantly; you can see their nervousness through the nail biting, the restless finger tapping and the general sense of alertness which wasn’t there just few minutes before. Someone knocks at the door. The eyes of every one turn to that direction, almost holding their breaths.

Then one of the children runs to open the door and a man strikes the child’s face as he enters.

“Why didn’t you open sooner, you little heathen? What were you doing? One of these days I’ll find out about your evil affairs and I’ll have you pay for them!”

The kid didn’t even think of answering. Instead, he set his gaze on the ground, silently sobbing. Another son came handing him the home shoes.”Good evening, dad”, he dares, wishing him with a broken smile. The parent looked odiously at him. “Good evening, Dad”, he mocks, “You think yourself so smart, huh? Who do you think you are? What’s good in this evening or in anything at all when I have the misfortune of having three retarded kids? You, go bring me a glass of water! Now! Fast!”

The third kid ran coming back with the glass, but in his hurry, tripped over and spilled some water over the father’s clothes.

Everything remained still.

Time was frozen. The sons were petrified. Each one of them knew exactly what was going to happen.

The window was blinded by darkness but you could still hear the sound of the belt, of lacerated skin, of hopeless tears and crushed hearts…

You are horrified. There are other windows, but you have had enough; you don’t want to see anything else. You run, letting row upon row, story upon story of windows pass you by. You push the wind away, ride on time’s shoulders, and try to move away – but from their stories, you cannot escape.

Every window, every floor screams out a story. From the corner of your eye, you make out the figure of a young man behind a window composed of broken shards. You see his misery, the ever-so-slight bend of his back, the snowy powder descending from his shaky hands onto his faded jeans, and the company of empty bottles all around him.

Each window blends chaotically into the next like a train zooming past a train station on tracks that go on forever. Tired, exhausted of this palace of horror, you clutch your head in your hands, shaking away what you have seen. The young man, the little boys, the life behind those windows.

You walk away, trying to close the shutters of your mind.

But alas, you realize that won’t be possible. After seeing this palace’s many stories, you now have a story of your own to tell, a story that others should peek into. A short story that unfortunately describes the life of too many families.

It’s no longer an exception to find parents who behave impeccably among their favorite companions yet turn merciless at home. It’s no longer unheard of to hear of abuse at home, the parents not realizing that their violence – whether physical, emotional or psychological – has a profound impact on the children and leaves deep scars in their memories.

They never realize that this violence leads the children to later become miserable and dangerous members of the society. The abuse chain only continues, with these same children now treating their own families in the same way that they have been treated in childhood…

You now see that these stories must be learned from, to end this vicious cycle. After peeking into these windows, you emerge with a better realization that no healthy society can prosper from this behavior…

We must all see that every window sparkles and shines when the sun is out, but its real beauty is revealed when the darkness sets in and there is only light from within.

The Prophet (may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him) said: “The best of you is the best one towards his family”.

May Allah (glorified and exalted be He) make us among them.