nature – saara

human

rory-bjorkman-17135

O mankind !
Be careful of your duty to your Lord
Who created you from a single soul
and from it created its mate
and from them twain hath spread abroad
a multitude of men and women

Holy Qur’an 4:1

I don’t know who you are
nor do I need to know

but I do know what makes you alive,
what carries hope inside,

what hurts when there is pain,

what feels elation at the
sight of the beloved one.

Let us recognize each other,
not as the other

but as the mirror by which
we judge the degree to
which our own souls
can expect salvation.

When you cry, know that I do too,
if simply on the inside.

There is something undeniably natural
in coming together over what it means to
be human.

I don’t care for the past
or for memories gone,

but I do care for the
essence within me and within you,

which ultimately,
and most hopefully,
in all the deepest hope and truest dream

are going again to a shared plane,
where joys are evident, and love
is the air we breathe.

Start over

field-thunderstorm-rainy-meadow Image source: https://www.pexels.com/photo/country-lane-field-meadow-puddles-1551/

Everything always comes to a head,
like gray clouds on a breezy summer afternoon.

They roll in suddenly, catching us unawares.

It rains

and there is relief
not for the ground, but for the tired sky.

There was a lot to hold on to
and now it has been let go.

Start over,
start again,
whatever that means to you.

life’s horse

whitesheet — Click here for image source.

I can’t say that I want to grab life by the horns.
I think I would rather watch it come together
with time like the soft creases of a baby’s smile.

I would rather lay life out like a sheet,
smoothing the wrinkles with my palms
and tugging here and there to make it fit.

I don’t care to iron first.

I want to watch a plastic beach ball rise and fall in the waves,
being carried here and there, appearing not to move
until some hours later when only a speck is visible in the distance.

I just want to see what will happen if I let go of the reins.

Do I believe that life’s horse will find its way home?

peace, peace, peace

image source: http://faxo.com/high-mountain-top-25051

There is something the matter with each of us.

Some of us weep in our homes, too “busy” to face our brethren.
Some of us are always on about the next best thing.

We may be neighbours but we resist becoming friends.

Where will you be, friend?

Where you will be at peace.

Where peace is friendly and friendship brings peace.

Peace, peace, peace.

Nothing else we ever asked for;
nothing else we ever knew.

It’s not that hard is it?

Peace must be somewhere, like a river or the sun;
Rising, now and again.

Why would we have to work so hard to get it,
and so hard to stay within it?

Once you get to a certain point,
it won’t be about what you do
but how you handle what’s done to you.

Peace, peace, peace.

Navroz Mubarak (2015)

Shoots of wheat. Image sourced from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheatgrass.

These days our eyes have opened to another sun,
quite further and beyond the one
that dapples everything with gold these evenings.

For the first time in our lives we yearn to cry,

navroz mubarak!

not for what has happened with us
but for what we hope will happen to you as well.

The day is here, and this time, springtime clichés are no longer.
Some seeds have grown up on their own into meaning.

How to describe this blessing?

Closing our eyes becomes the same as opening them;
this light continues beyond sight.

We are truly one this time, angelic in the abounding clarity
which at once we can see, and not see.

In our blessed gathering we are as light as we have ever been,
our true selves merging, one another with the rest.

Navroz (or Nowruz) is a festival celebrated around the world to commemorate the beginning of a new year and the first day of spring.

To learn more about Navroz, visit Wikipedia.org and/or TheIsmaili.org.

To read “navroz (2014)” on this blog, click here.

not one and the same

Oh, you’ve let me go,
says papery leaf, for a while miserable in the dampening mud.

Tree knows not the leaf
so tree discards the leaf;
they are not one and the same.

Leaf says,
Eventually I will return to you
in a way that you cannot refuse!

I will become you.

Leaf cries for the ground to take him in;
begs for the rain to dissolve him.

A story inspired during the autumn, but held back until an appropriate time.

Sometimes we don’t recognize ourselves in one another and it is difficult to appreciate our commonalities, what we share. Then again, we come from one source.

How can we adapt ourselves so that others will recognize us, and in so doing, embrace us as they would the known, the familiar?

to know ourselves

Starry sky. Image source: http://www.howtogeek.com/114384/desktop-fun-starry-skies-wallpaper-collection-series-2/

To know ourselves,

we sought out the most difficult paths
that we might gain something from walking them

climbed mountains, not to climb them,
but for a glimpse of the sparkling sky

travelled the world, not to see it,
but to meet the companion within.

This is not the world, but the whole of a mirror in front of me;
what a world, that was made simply for me!

In the whole world i have tried to see myself,
yet the whole world seems not enough.

Tell me, where should i seek that mirror,
the most beautiful of all

that mirror, which reflects me with such truth,
that i myself become it?

Tell me, who is that most familiar companion,
the one who can tell me
everything
about myself?

This first part of this piece emphasizes worldly obstacles and challenges as opportunities to increase self-knowledge.

The second part can be understood as alluding to Islamic understandings of the relationship between creation and the Creator.

on patience and potential

Monarch butterfly. Image source: http://www.inquisitr.com/388618/southwest-airlines-flies-late-blooming-monarch-butterfly-to-texas/

Said the lover to the beloved, who was consumed by fear of stagnating, of not fulfilling her potential, of wasting her precious time in life:

Look around you!

The apple could not have been picked sooner. The cocoon could not have opened earlier. But neither is sitting still, doing nothing. Both need time to grow.

You are the apple of my eye

and the butterfly of my heart.

I cannot wait until you feel for yourself the wings you are going to grow,

and see how beautiful you are.

At times, we may come to feel trapped within the paths we once chose, or that were chosen for us. We may come to feel that we are idly allowing the mystery, beauty and potential life offers, to pass us by.

This piece takes some words of wisdom that we have all been fortunate to receive at some point in our lives, and adapts them into a brief story.

white plains

Image source: http://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/506381

the night sets in deeper as we trudge across these white plains
crisscrossed with patterns of tire tracks

i whisper a desperate prayer: keep my love safe, and warm

it is one thing in theory to imagine being without you;
quite another to make this trek on my own

a few flecks of snow cling to the tear streams on my cheeks

i clasp my hands together, keeping close the hope of seeing you again.

We may be only a few miles from our beloved, and our white plains may be only parking lots, but: the great love stories are happening here, with us, today. Never was there a better time to feel, to love, to miss; to be.

two poems: “Museum” and “courtyard, unedited”

Two poems: Museum and courtyard, unedited

These pieces were written while and after visiting the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto, Canada. The first, Museum, is a reflection on history, civilizations, art and interpretation. The second piece, courtyard, unedited, was penned while sitting in the Museum’s inner courtyard, and has intentionally been left unedited in order to maintain for the reader, the flow of inspiration as originally felt. It contains English as well as another Hindi-Urdu mixed language that sometimes spills onto the page. Please excuse my rough transliteration attempt as neither of these is my first language.

View of the courtyard, looking up from the main floor. Copyright Asif Virani, 2014.

Up-close view of one of the metal screens/jaali on the second floor. Copyright Asif Virani, 2014.

Museum

What will the people from days to come decide to make of us,
what will they preserve in their halls?

Those gone by have become to us what remains of them,
after all tribulation and epiphany fell away into dust.

They have become what we can still understand of them.

There is too much left to know about knowing; not enough left to see.

We fear we are penning lines already penned by those greater than us,
a people that truly saw the truth unfold.

Nothing can be said now that has not been said before;
our efforts, mere echoes of a greater, grander voice.

What inspired these carvers, and what were they trying to say –
can we be certain that we have preserved ourselves against misunderstanding?

Did they create these shapes because those are what they saw,
or were they too, seeking to lose themselves in detailed but repetitive abstraction?

Do these patterns transcend a name?

~ ~ ~

courtyard, unedited

is jahaan mein hum upna sub kuch kho sakte hain,
sub kuch seekh bhi saktehain

aisa husn ko bananekiliye, aisi roshni, is roshni, ki zaroorat hai

this light is something like the light of the heavens and the earth;
this light has an unnameable quality to it,
a way for all to see all

bathed in it my hand resting on the table becomes something from another world,
translucent, light diffusing outward in the place of rosy flesh

your eyes are from another time here, where patterns repeat themselves to liberate beyond eye’s capacity, where voices rise to a crescendo and we take in,

light,
light,
light, light light,

upon our hands, our face, and every
one is so beautiful here today

yahaan aake kuch bhi likhdijiye,
sub kuch shahiri banjayegi

yahaan aake kuch khaaneki zaroorat nahin mehsoos hoti,
in hawaaon, saa(n)son, is jahaan ka rooh hi kaafi hai

yahaan rehekar kuch chaate hai hum,
kuch khona bhi chaate hain

kuch cheez samaj na chaate hain hum,
kuch cheez humko yaad aatihai

kuch cheez hamaari thi, hamaari hai,
hamaare dil me se nikalke,
humhi ke aage jhoom uthi

keherahihai:

agar aapke dil mein koi baat phool ki tarha khilrahihain,
to usse khilne do;
mat sochiye

agar aapke ander koi baat hai, to aap dil ki zubaan se usse pehsh karo,
chaahe koi samje ya na samje

agar koi lafz kaafi nahin lagte,
to khudh ke lafaazon banaalo

khudh ki zubaan banaalo,

koi samje, ya na samje

A rough translation of courtyard, unedited:

in this place/world we can lose/forget everything of/about ourselves;
we can also learn everything

to make this kind of beauty, this type of light, this light, is needed

…

come here and write anything at all,
it will become poetry / anything written here becomes poetry

here, there is no need felt for eating,
these winds, breaths, the soul of this place/world is enough

staying/being here, we desire something;
also, something we wish to lose

some things we understand,
and some things, we remember

some things were ours, are ours;
some things come out from our own hearts
and have come alive/to dance in front of us

they say:

if something blossoms like a flower in your heart,
then allow it to blossom,
think not

if there is something in you that wants to be said, then use the language of your heart to convey it,
whether anyone understands or not

if no words seem enough,
then make up your own words

make up your own language,

whether anyone understands, or not

dissolving further all the time (2014)

Somewhere along Balmy Beach, Toronto, ON. © Saara Punjani 2013. — Somewhere along Balmy Beach, Toronto, ON.
© Saara Punjani 2013.

each time we turned
to rise above this illusion of the finite,
we were met with a ceiling – not yet, not yet

we made steady ablutions
and we kept a hopeful heart
and still, we were not crowned to go on

a kite without a string
would be blown every which way on the ground;

a kite with a string
rises high in finite direction

yet, without the string
we could not have come
as far as we already have

how far must we rise before the string can be cut;
before we are unbound from the direction of our path?

how far must we rise before we are taken into the skies,
mere specks, dissolving further all the time?

on this day, listen, to the quiet,
as clearly, some things are being said

whether we move,
upward,
inward,
outward or forward,
we cannot begin to say

the tides pull us away,
that we forget you;

the tides push us so far
that we fall right in

here we have always been, unmoving in the movement,
immersed in the truth of your most impressive signs

let us dig deeper, look farther, stay awake longer;
let us continue searching for you

let us be so obviously engrossed,
mere specks, dissolving further all the time

the crispness of this season (2014)

Autumn, somewhere near Mont-Tremblant, QC. © Asif Virani, 2014. — Autumn, somewhere near Mont-Tremblant, QC.
© Asif Virani, 2014.

the crispness of this season
asks to know both who we were
and who we are

the maple, the oak, watch over themselves with silent grace
as the leaves they laboured to produce,
and that kept them alive,
dry out and fall steadily away

what remains of our victories and defeats,
of our convictions and our epiphanies?

we have been able to keep nothing
material from our endeavours

who can say whether we leave the past
or if it leaves us;

whether we ourselves walked paths
or if they grew up beneath our feet?

we have had nothing
and nothing has been ours

and yet, we are not who we remember.

the colours of our progression (2014)

The colours of our progression, somewhere outside Montreal. © Saara Punjani 2014. — The colours of our progression, somewhere outside Montreal, QC. © Saara Punjani 2014.

they say time waits for no one

never has there been enough time
to cultivate a sense of fearlessness;

always too much time
to make idols of inspiration

we have remained too young
to say that we live our lives with any grace;
too old to say, this is the end of our allotment

after all the hands have been shaken,
all the pages turned, the bellies filled

after all the smiles are spent
and all the comforts acquired,

we sit by the window to watch the colours of our progression

some things live out their course
and pass on and away in the height of their glory

but some of us are always green

we wait our turn;
we wait, to turn,
to mature into our very own shade of sienna

they say, time waits for no one

but for some, it never comes at all

to the beloved (2014)

A colour we cannot name. © Saara Punjani 2014. — A colour we cannot name.
© Saara Punjani 2014.

the water of the stream flows to its end
and i, flow in all planes to the beloved

the beloved calls, and i dissolve into the wind;
the beloved exists, so i go

these waters gleam now and again silver,
now and again a colour we cannot name

once,

we think,

we think we glimpsed the beloved’s face reflected there

now we undertake this pilgrimage every day

the beloved is, so i am too,

for the moment

the water of the stream flows to its end

and i, on my way to the beloved

the shower of your blessing (2014)

this, is the shower of your blessing
the one that comes down as music
needing only something off which to sound

we hover now, on the best place there is:
on the threshold, a step away from your rain,
but not fully inside of it

only here can we truly appreciate what you send

were we immersed,
we could not see how this rain drops abundantly on every leaf,
each of which curls, bows, in gratitude

were we too far away
we could not see how this rain constantly merges with itself,
ever merging into larger course

a trickle to a stream, a stream to a river:
instinctively, we know where this merger leads

what sun shines here (2014)

a flower blooms steadily in love:

desiring for sun to gaze upon its every part

yearning for dew to slide slowly over each curve

at the peak of its love, each petal arches so strongly

that it breaks free of everything and goes on

what sun shines here, a dusty lamp;
what morning wet, a mere drop

tell me, if i break free,
will you place a palm underneath and carry me?

unlidded (2014)

a power enters our vessel this night

we stand, electrified
as a force from elsewhere courses through

for months we have opened this door and that

looking for the place we once stumbled upon
looking for the feeling which could not be stored

now here, under crescent moon and darkened sky
where soft waves keep consistent rhythm

here, is a glistening sign

what has taken hold of us this time?

the sky as though unlidded;
ourselves, similarly so

what stirs the trees to move as they do?
what force leaves its mark in the sand?

this power both beckons and warns

once again we are on the verge of sleeplessness,
once more, on the edge of your cliff

the time of our rose (2014)

the time of our rose has passed us,
and we become more bitter by the day

reach out your hand and pluck us, love;
remove us from the misery of these days

this is not our season;
this place is not our stage

linger though we might,
we are so much less dazzling
though we recall how beautiful
we’ve once been

the blossom that grew us
from the seed of our names
robed us in a quality,
innate

have we been asleep,
or have we been afraid
to let go, to move on,
come what may?

there is no telling
what we will be
the moment after the one
where we are

what fruit may we bear,
if we trust in ourselves,
if we let ourselves be,
who we are?

our bitterness weighs
on the very branch that nurtured us,
and we wilt and we droop in our pain

our poison spreads

we see it,
but we don’t stop it,
and that makes us very afraid.

the world and places like it (2014)

The most beautiful thing. © Saara Punjani 2014.

dearest,

why do we go all around
the world and places like it?

why do you want to take me where you’ve been?

what makes you whole
makes me whole, too

the feeling you seek,
is my life

how long will we flit,
two bees on the same flower
returning home to tell stories
of the most beautiful thing?

what you love, is what i love too,
though i am not your bee

you needn’t see with my eyes,
you needn’t feel with my heart

to know how hundreds of fields
become one

the frame (2014)

i would love to be in your movie

see how you frame those in love?

their breath, crisp on water wings
their abode, all of nature’s backdrop
every celestial body shaamil in their moment

would that i could be the one in the frame,
the one in the midst of it all

their love through the lens,
the viewer twice-removed

you are her, the beloved in the frame,
says the one farther removed than i

navroz (2014)

what is new about this day, navroz?

is it simply the flip of a sunny switch, or the overnight emergence of garden weed?

what do you want to be?
what do you want to change?

you have had the winter to yourself

now, prepare yourself to be grown

prepare yourself to be tamed, pruned
and tethered at the hands of another

prepare yourself to shift your roots
in accommodation of those that grow beside

it hurts, the pain of limiting yourself
though you know your own potential
to spread far and wide

but, if you shift your roots appropriately,
you will have set stage below ground for what will come to be above

what harmony you create in the hidden
is in every way what will come to be seen, outside

your choice to curb the tumorous growth of your self
is the reason for the interwoven canopy above

in the tree (2014)

the essence of fleshy fruit lies in the pit,

the essence of pit, in the seed

the essence of seed, in the gift of new life;

the essence of life, in the tree.

what is winter (2014)

Winter, somewhere near Ottawa, Canada. © Saara Punjani 2013.

dearest,

has not spring followed every winter of your life?

your task is not to hurry along the new season,
but to grow your stores of patience
so that you may quietly weather the cold

in cycles you fall and rise
in cycles you pain and grow

what is winter if not the ultimate growing pain?

your task is not to despair in the receding light,
but to close your eyes in proportion
so that you may continue to remain in harmony

what is winter if not the ultimate preparation for change?

your task is not to cling to what once grew on you,
but to let what has served its purpose gracefully fall away
so that you may remain open to embrace new plantings

what is winter if not the ultimate opportunity for reflection?

your task is not to cry, not to blind yourself with the memory of what once was,
but to bravely face your bare reflection in frozen pools
so that you may know what you are at your core.

mountain king (2014)

we set out to meet our maker
in the valleys of setting sun

we followed an empty road out of the city
and drove until all warmth melted into snowy plain

like flagships in gloomy distance,
the longer we looked, the more appeared;
subtle crowns on foreheads of sky

then around one bend, we stopped breathing:
he loomed, terrible king of the sky,
pulling us ever downward, drawing us ever more near

we had no choice but to go to him,
terrible king of the sky.

mountain spirits blew chilling winds in circles

we see youuuu we know what is in your heaaart

we faltered, we went forward; we could not move, we tried to turn back
— all the while he watched us, terrible king of the sky.

mountain king, bone of earth,
ruthless, ever-present

you have seen me and I you

mountain king, your spirits call,
death,
in the valley howls.

it feels like spring here (2007)

a spring of creamy butterfly wings beating joyfully
beating joyfully on the beating walls
of your stomach beating with joy

a spring of sudden wind gusts
that rush up behind and
with gusto, sweep you off your feet

a spring of a sun reborn
awakening earlier with each morning
less and less eager to depart

it feels like spring here

I feel the butterflies
in my stomach, anxiously
waiting for you

when you lift
me off my feet I hear
that gust

the sun lingers but
time hurries by,
as if to compensate

it feels a lot like spring here
with you,
with spring