Have Mercy on Me My Soul

Have Mercy On Me My Soul

By Khalil Gibran

Why are you weeping, my Soul?
Knowest thou my weakness?
Thy tears strike sharp and injure,
For I know not my wrong.
Until when shalt thou cry?
I have naught but human words to interpret your dreams,
Your desires, and your instructions.
Look upon me, my Soul;
I have consumed my full life heeding your teachings.
Think of how I suffer!
I have exhausted my life following you.
My heart was glorying upon the throne,
But is now yoked in slavery;
My patience was a companion,
But now contends against me;
My youth was my hope,
But now reprimands my neglect.
Why, my Soul, are you all-demanding?
I have denied myself pleasure
And deserted the joy of life
Following the course which you impelled me to pursue.
Be just to me,
Or call Death to unshackle me,
For justice is your glory.
Have mercy on me, my Soul.
You have laden me with Love until I cannot carry my burden.
You and Love are inseparable might;
Substance and I are inseparable weakness.
Will e’er the struggle cease between the strong and the weak?
Have mercy on me, my Soul.
You have shown me Fortune beyond my grasp.
You and Fortune abide on the mountain top;
Misery and I are abandoned together in the pit of the valley.
Will e’er the mountain and the valley unite?
Have mercy on me, my Soul.
You have shown me Beauty,
But then concealed her.
You and Beauty live in the light;
Ignorance and I are bound together in the dark.
Will e’er the light invade darkness?
Your delight comes with the Ending,
And you revel now in anticipation;
But this body suffers with the life
While in life.
This, my Soul, is perplexing.
You are hastening toward Eternity,
But this body goes slowly toward perishment.
You do not wait for him,
And he cannot go quickly.
This, my Soul, is sadness.
You ascend high, though heaven’s attraction,
But this body falls by earth’s gravity.
You do not console him,
And he does not appreciate you.
This, my Soul, is misery.
You are rich in wisdom,
But this body is poor in understanding.
You do not compromise,
And he does not obey.
This, my Soul, is extreme suffering.
In the silence of the night you visit The Beloved
And enjoy the sweetness of His presence.
This body ever remains,
The bitter victim of hope and separation.
This, my Soul, is agonizing torture.
Have mercy on me, my Soul!

This is a poem I wrote 10 years ago. Its a poem about the search for purpose and the paralyzing pain of not knowing it.

Niche

My bones want to melt

My muscles want to let go

My body wants to stop

Walking,

Struggling

Fighting,

for air,

for life.

My mind painted a picture for me,

But now it’s all in black and white.

The trees are bent, tired, closed.

My heart, the same

But still, my thoughts keep talking,

Walking,

Struggling,

Fighting,

For air,

For life.

How can you erase a picture so clear,

So real?

Tell me how to erase myself from it,

And lay, my own tired steps to rest.

I see

I’m stumbling,

Not walking.

I’m tripping now

Not talking.

There’s a pain inside my chest

Born of silence, grief, unrest

Who’s there but me to claim it?

Who knows but me to name it?

I’m sorry for my apathy,

My lassitude at dawn.

I’m circling now through forests

Trying to find my niche.

Has inspiration come to me?

Whose voice is it I hear?

My own is sharp and deafening.

Who else could know my name?

It is only through His kindness

That the heart can speak

When the mind and body

are numb,

Only dragging. 

Please come,

If only to quiet my thoughts.

I’m circling forests

On wings

Still searching for my niche.

I’m no longer

Walking,

Struggling,

Fighting.

I’ve won the air

I’ve won my life.

I Prayed for Peace Today

I Prayed for Peace Today
By: Yasmin Mogahed

February 23, 2010 12:37 am 

I found myself praying for peace today.
I've been in and out of my mind a thousand times
I know You heard me.
I know I wasn't alone in that room,
shaking with the fear of fear,
the harrowing loneliness.
I cried out to You on my hands. On my knees.
With my face pushed down against the ground.
If I could have gotten lower, I swear I would.
Because that is helplessness, the truest kind…
The kind that knows nothing, not one leaf, or tear, or smile can be
without Him.
I learned something today.
Again.
This is dunya. Dunya. Not a place of ease. Only glitter.
The place where you have to feel cold and hungry.
The place where you have to worry and feel scared.
The place where it gets cold.
So cold, sometimes.
The place where you have to leave the people you love.
Where you can’t get attached, because even if you do, it doesn’t make it stay, it just makes it hurt when it doesn’t.
The place where happiness and sadness are only players, waiting for their next line in a play…
Competing for their place on stage.
The place where gravity makes you fall, and frailty makes you bleed.
The place where sadness exists, because it must.
And tears fall to remind you of a place where they don’t.
Where they just don’t.

And isn’t that just it? Isn’t jennah that place after all,
that place that Allah describes over and over and over in 2 ways?:
La khawfun alayhim wa la hum yahzanoon…
On them shall be no fear…nor shall they grieve.

But I’m still here, aren’t I?
The scar on my flesh reminds me of that.
The burn on my arm left a scar that I love.
I love it because it reminds me how weak I am.
How human.
That I burn. That I bleed. That I break. That I scar.
Yes. It is here that I am. Here that I fall. Here that I cry.
Here, just the same, that You filled that room, and lifted me to humbleness, and an acute knowledge of my own powerlessness and excruciating need for You.
And then you took care of it.
Of course You did.
Of course.
Like Younus, and Musa, and his mother. You took care of it.
You are the Peace of the peaceful.
The Strength of the strong.
The lighthouse of Truth in this storm of lies.
So, I found myself praying for peace today.

Die before your death

Die before your death

By: Yasmin Mogahed

Tell me I can get lost

Tell me I can lose myself in your Presence

In the overwhelming moment of real submission

Tell me I can remain forever broken

In You

For You

With You.

Tell me I can remain here forever

Away, while still here.

Did not the Prophet say: “die before your death”?

At first I thought maybe it was only a reminder to remember our meeting with You.

But then I thought how I wish I could die before my death:

Have a soul that is no longer in this life—even while the body must remain.

A heart that is freed from the shackles of dunya—even while the body must walk its streets.

Have a nafs that is in complete rest and satisfaction with its’ Lord, even while the crumbling shell remains.

A soul that is already there—even before it is there.

A soul detached .

A nafs mutmainah—in the truest and deepest and realest sense (Quran 89:27)

For as the great scholar said, rahimahuAllah, “he who does not enter the paradise of this life, will not enter the paradise of the next.“

An Open Letter to the Dunya

I wrote this on my phone while on a flight...

An Open Letter to the Dunya

By: Yasmin Mogahed

It’s hard to explain the freedom. It’s so deep and so real. Looking through the confusion, the empty boxes and hollow images, I saw you – Dunya. You place veil after veil over my eyes. Trying to win me, deceive me, enslave me to your lies. When the truth is you couldn’t give me even a drop of water when I stood at your door begging. I was on my knees before you, desperate for you to fill me.

What I see now is a glimpse of clarity that only the stab of perpetual disappointment could carve. And I sit here surrounded by your henchmen, your army of liars sent to keep me in chains. But I won’t be your prisoner anymore. I will no longer be that little girl lying awake at night thinking of you. I am no longer that heartbroken child wasting her tears on you. My unrequited love can no longer break me. You won’t break me. I won’t bend to your glitter and false promises. I am no longer that faithful subject standing before your false throne. My tears are no longer yours to have. And my heart is no longer your sanctuary.

You can’t live here anymore.

I’ve traveled a long way to come here. Sometimes there were deserts where all I needed was a single drop of water that you couldn’t give. Sometimes storms, where all I needed was a flicker of light to guide my path. But I asked you again and again for what you could not give. For all you have is pomp, boasting and chattel of deception. And so I found myself again and again in deserts without water, in darkness without light. But I am no longer your slave for there was a man who came to liberate me from this. A man who came to liberate me from this slavery to the slave, and bring me to the slavery of the Lord of the slave.

The Stab

The Stab
By: Yasmin Mogahed


Don’t grieve at the stab.
It’s only meant to free you.
From the chains that bind you to the earth
and shackle you to the shadows of people.
The mirage of water cannot quench.
But is so beautiful to the thirsty.
I’m afraid. Of never knowing another life.
Different. So different.
If I let go, will You take me higher?
Above grief, want, loss.
Above all that I’ve ever known.
Take me higher. Unbind me from the earth.
Like a vaccine, it sickens, to make you stronger.
The stab is temporary. The freedom, eternal.

We buried a man today: a reflection on death

I wrote this in the car on my way back home from the burial of a righteous soul. May Allah have mercy on him and his family. Ameen.

Jan 14, 2011 8:19 pm

We buried a man today: a reflection on death

By: Yasmin Mogahed

We buried a man today. And here I am now on my way home in the caravan of the living. For now.

For now, you and I are in the caravan of the living. But not because we’re headed for a separate land. Not because they’re going and we are not. Only because our caravan lagged behind. Right now we’re driving back to our homes, our beds, our tvs, our stereos, our jobs, our exams, our friends, our facebook, and gchat. Right now we’re driving back to our distractions, our idols, our deceptive illusions. But that’s just it. I’m not driving back to my home, my bed, my tv and my stereo. I’m not returning to my job, my exams, my friends, my facebook and gchat. I’m not on my way back to my distractions, illusions and idols. I’m driving back to where I began. I’m driving now to the very same place he went to. I’m on my way to the same place. I just don’t know how long my drive will take.

I’m driving back to where I began: with God. Because God is Al-Awal (the Beginning) and God is Al-Akhir (the End).

My body is taking me there, but it’s only a vehicle. When I get there, it will stay behind. As he did today. My body came from the ground and it will go back to the ground, as it came. It was only a shell, a container for my soul. A companion for a while. But I’ll leave it here when I arrive. Arrive—not depart. Because that’s my home. Not this. That’s why when Allah is calling the back the righteous soul, He says, ‘irjiee’: return.

The beautiful, noble soul that we buried didn’t depart from life today. He just entered a higher—and God willing--better level of it. He only arrived home. But the body is made of the material world and so he had to leave it here. The body is of the lower world. The world where we need to eat and sleep and bleed and cry. And die. But the soul is of the higher world. The soul has only one need: to be with God.

And so while the body cries and bleeds and feels pain from the material world, the soul is untouched by these things. There is only one thing that can cut or stab or hurt the soul. There is only one thing that can kill it: depriving it of its’ only need: to be close to its’ Originator. To be near God. And so we should not weep for the arriving soul--It isn’t dead. We should weep instead for the one whose body is alive, but whose soul is dead because of its’ alienation from that which gives it life: God.

And so the believing soul races home, even while in this life.

Oh Lord, make my soul a sanctuary, a fortress within. That no one and nothing can disturb. A place of calm, silence, serenity, untouched by the outside world. The soul that Allah calls al-nafs al mutmaina. The soul that Allah calls back saying: ‘ya ayatuhal nafs ul mutmainnah, irjiee illa rabike radiyatan mardiya. Fadkhulie fee ibadee wadkhulee janatee.

“(To the righteous soul will be said:) "O (thou) soul, in (complete) rest and satisfaction!"Come back thou to thy Lord,- well pleased (thyself), and well-pleasing unto Him!"Enter thou, then, among My devotees!"Yea, enter thou My Heaven!” (89:27-30)