Nooj

whisper in the trees

2009-11-12T23:57:00.003+02:00

Credit for pic

Seconds before the rain
with the sweetest smell ever to alight
the fragile sense of scent

The earth shattered

Roots and mortar, hearts and joints,
we fled. we had to. into, those crevices
of mihrab and ostracism,
and decayed. and hid. and cried

Centuries of tears lie within your soul dear human,
forget us not, repress us not, regret us not,
for through us you may taste abundance

All I wish for Us

2009-11-12T09:36:00.002+02:00

"The point is, I'd much rather have my time consumed making my own bread outdoors than kill it watching some reality TV show in a so-called "living" room. Where money once provided me with my primary sense of security, I now find it in friends and the local community. Some of my closest mates are people I only met because I had to build real relationships with others based on trust and kindness, not money"
Read it all here

Post Mortem

2009-11-06T14:18:00.002+02:00

It is only in hindsight that you see how innocent and beautiful
some of the things that scare you in life are.

Veteran

2009-11-01T00:23:00.003+02:00

I am acutely aware of the creeping in of agedness,
In my exasperation at their excitement based on ignorance,
In how I can predict the blooming of flowers, from memory,
In my marvelling respect for those who filled in the clouds,
In my letting go to give their ideas space,
And in my deep sense of responsibility,
To be remembered by Right, and to leave them with Good

Between you and I

2009-10-31T23:51:00.006+02:00

"It was not her fault. She was like the water that freezes inside a rock and breaks it apart. It was no more her fault than it is the fault of the water when the rock shatters" One Stab

This is a secret. We do know. As women we are aware of how we smile and how we look away and how we move towards you. We notice the look in your eyes and your eyes following us across the room. And sometimes, we want more than we need, more than we can appreciate. We can love three different people at the same time, in different ways and want them all to be enraptured by us. We can make our tears hurt more than your pride being wounded. This is more than about relationships. Beyond the world of men and women there is a world of women. Where we have Khadija's, Aasiyah's and Maryams and Bilqees's. They fight, not only for their own salvation, but for the world of women to move beyond games, towards battles, towards purpose and towards independent and free-spirited achievement. And it comforts me that somewhere out there, there is also a world of men that aspires beyond.

The One Comfort

2009-10-31T00:03:00.003+02:00

Credit for pic

You have to dream about it
Even when you do it every day

2009-10-26T23:41:00.005+02:00

HugsCrush

WantsBunk

DespairImpairs

HopeRopes

Love, Doesnt

Parasputing and Khadija challenge:Tick tock

2009-10-18T23:46:00.004+02:00

she can't wait for him any longer. the buses will have stopped and home deserves her more right now. yes, we must be optimistic, we must be open to this. mums are right but not ever at the precise second when they say it. the days seem to get longer and yet time less tangible. ah but clocks are a fetish she shall not deny. let's stop at kitsch kool on the way home, it's always a pick me up. and it was the inkomazi one more so, she bought it for her domestic, not sure if it was appropriate but spontaneous gestures have more credence, instinct is something deep and yet so altogether stupid it seems. heathen, primitive, lower order, id. who does not love their id. can love exist without an id. she doesnt believe so, love is surrendering to and fighting the id at the same time. loving humans is so silly though, and base and relative and easy. loving ideals, loving for the sake of something that you can taste in the fountain of heaven, like the ability to have pink streaks brightening your morning this is...

Time's up.
I doubt I would have gotten anywhere but where I did though.
I tag Fatima but she must do it in 2 weeks.

No

2009-10-16T01:27:00.004+02:00

Sometimes*
Staring into the tiger's eyes
Forces her to cower, purr and
Roll over for her belly to be rubbed

Don't hide from Love,
Deceived by her apparent repulsiveness.

Beyond appearance lies Faith

*Sometimes you get gobbled up. Life is worth the risk.

I've learnt

2009-10-13T09:21:00.003+02:00

That good intentions are never enough. Here, and there.
You're going to need some resolve and some love and some talent and some absolute surrender and some fighting when you have nothing to stop your good intentions from being fucked into smithereens, and to be your propeller when your toes let go of the clouds.

Aesthetics

2009-10-04T09:06:00.004+02:00

These are two of my favourite actresses based on the sole criterion of loveliness. I don't think its queer that girls can find girls lovely and vice versa- it's just an indication of the type of beauty we appreciate. I deliberately chose a "natural" picture of Keira, I wish the majority of pictures of her on google images didn't feature artificially inflated boobs, she has pretty enough features. Winona has always fascinated me- I remember as a young kid I had those CNA diaries with all the movie stars and she was my favourite, despite the shoplifting charges that came later on. I like how she stars in the non mainstream stuff and didn't go through the "Jennifer Aniston complex" for fame. Edward Scissorhands and Girl, Interrupted for example. I love Edward Scissorhands, I think Tim Burton type humour flushes Judd Apaptow type humour down the toilet. There is no point to this disjointed post, I just found it interesting that the two actresses I find lovely resemble one another, gives credence to evolutionary theory.

I think

2009-09-30T20:20:00.004+02:00

Half of love is

Resting your shoulders and eyes

From flying the kite

(Link with scarecrow explained in this story)

For everyone's favourite video game geek/ punk islam indoctrinator/ pop culture comedian

2009-09-29T22:07:00.003+02:00

The Hidden

2009-09-28T19:30:00.006+02:00

Cancerous blood clots gather in the dusty corners of your soul,
where Fear says you cannot, are not, explore not
The More, the Other, the Me you cannot Feel

Weddings are...

2009-09-26T23:11:00.005+02:00

Flowers,
Scenery,
and Giggles in fitting rooms.

The Breathing

2009-09-25T22:30:00.006+02:00

Now, you have two choices. To huddle within and be who you were, or to let go and allow Life to decide who you can be...

**Blog format ripped from my latest fetish

Potholing cerebral grooves

2009-09-19T04:03:00.002+02:00

On my way, passing the library, as always, I detour past your shelf
Agriculture magazine racks disguise it today, if it was there at all

Typing out a report I click on your playlist, needing some rhythmic rejuvenation
A stuttering burst of jazz perplexes me, did I misplace it?

Smelling pineapples in the fruitress I remember your craving,
Out of season, dearie, smiles the kindly old cashier

Friends take me for Italian, I eagerly turn to the starters for your speciality,
But all I see is a bevy of foreign-sounding soup mixes

Anxiety waves through my spine, am I dreaming? No, I realise, it is just folly to believe
Your presence can exist in my life, yet out of my heart

Being a guest at the Prophet SAW's mosque in Medinah- Picture blog

2009-09-18T12:54:00.005+02:00

The electronic umbrellahs that shield visitors from the sun close after Maghrib in Medinah

Iftar outside the Prophet SAW's Mosque in Medinah- not one person goes hungry in this city during Ramadhan Just before fast breaking (Iftar) in Medinah

MoonLight

2009-08-23T11:36:00.003+02:00

It seems a blogger vogue this year to find an image that conjures the Ramadhan feeling for you and try to atriculate that, a chic spin off from Rorsharch projective techniques. I tag all those that haven't yet to try it. The pic above comes from here, it is a Saguraro or Harvest moon that was named so because it allowed farmers to harvest crops by moonlight. the The moon has great resonance with Ramadhaan for me, as we search for the Hilal and as it keeps us company during the qiyamulalyl. My favourite time of day during Ramadhan and also during Spring and Summer generally, is the half an hour before Maghrib when a content tranquility settles over the earth, as the rush of the day eases, and we can breathe deeper and reflect on our actions for the day. In Ramadhan that time of day for me is a transition from Sabr to Shukr, from submission to Allah's will, to gratefulness for His bounties. We are grateful for having the mental and bodily strength to serve him, we are thankful for his Mercy in allowing us to break our fast with the food and drink He has created specially for our enjoyment.

The verse is also special for me, perhaps because it has the word Noor in it 5 times. It is very positive, encouraging us towards light instead of reprimanding us for darkness. I enjoy Ibn al Qayyim's beautiful commentary. The entire thing is a bit long but here is the excerpt most applicable to me right now:

It is about this light-its abode, its bearer and its fuel-that God has coined the parable of the niche, which is like the breast. In this niche lies a globe made of purest glass, like a glistening planet in whiteness and purity-a similitude for the heart, likened to glass inasmuch as it possesses the qualities of the believer's heart: clarity, fineness and firmness. By its clarity [the believer] sees truth and direction; by its fineness he acquires kindness and mercy; by its firmness he combats God's enemies, and stands firm in his resistance to them and upholds the truth.

In contrast to this heart, there are two other reprehensible types. One is the heart that is hard like stone, devoid of compassion, generosity or social good; devoid, too, of the clarity by which God may be seen-a heart dominated by ignorance, with neither knowledge of the truth, nor compassion for fellow creatures.

The other is the heart that is as weak as water. It is devoid of strength and firmness, accepts any idea, but lacks the strength to stand by what it accepts. It is devoid of the power to affect anyone, but is itself affected by everything it mingles with-be it strong or weak, wholesome or tainted.

May this Ramadhan be a process of compassion and strength for all our hearts Insha Allah.

Something I never thought I would understand

2009-08-17T14:42:00.007+02:00

No one talks about this part, the being a leaf in the wind part.
So I'm saying it. You will not care, you will get to a point where nothing can take this away from you even if it just left five minutes ago. And it's totally out of character for your need to control. You haven't become someone else, or forgotten who you are, you just have learnt a new coping mechanism.
If the first person who discovered fire had just put her hand over it to own it, she would have burnt her fingers and put out the fire. So you must be alright with exposing it to the wind, it can only get stronger or fly away and you have no choice in the matter.
Without thinking you trust the wind, because otherwise you'll miss out on the scenery. And that will be missing the whole point of jumping. Jumping with your eyes closed out of fear or ignorance means you didn't really want to jump.
I'm sorry if I appear a little removed from it all right now, because until I crash land there's nothing that can make me care.
Ila yawmil waqtil ma'loom

**A lovely, talented and wordphiliac friend has just joined our cult. Please welcome her here

100:1 is not a War, It's a Massacre: Prof Norman Finkelstein

2009-08-13T15:46:00.004+02:00

Keffiyeh Day: 14th August 2009

In Jerusalem by Mahmoud Darwish
In Jerusalem, and I mean within the ancient walls,
I walk from one epoch to another without a memory
to guide me. The prophets over there are sharing
the history of the holy . . . ascending to heaven
and returning less discouraged and melancholy, because love
and peace are holy and are coming to town.
I was walking down a slope and thinking to myself: How
do the narrators disagree over what light said about a stone?
Is it from a dimly lit stone that wars flare up?
I walk in my sleep. I stare in my sleep. I see
no one behind me. I see no one ahead of me.
All this light is for me. I walk. I become lighter. I fly
then I become another. Transfigured. Words
sprout like grass from Isaiah’s messenger
mouth: “If you don’t believe you won’t believe.”
I walk as if I were another. And my wound a white
biblical rose. And my hands like two doves
on the cross hovering and carrying the earth.
I don’t walk, I fly, I become another,
transfigured. No place and no time. So who am I?
I am no I in ascension’s presence. But I
think to myself: Alone, the prophet Mohammad
spoke classical Arabic. “And then what?”
Then what? A woman soldier shouted:
Is that you again? Didn’t I kill you?
I said: You killed me . . . and I forgot, like you, to die.

Nil magnum, Nisi bonum- No Greatness without Goodness

2009-08-03T10:24:00.004+02:00

I found this in Life of Pi. And it encapsulates a lot of my philosophy of life I feel. This post isn't about me but somehow all my posts need to have an "I" in them. This is called metacognition, I tell students. Focus. I'm trying to find a further origin of that quote without success. But the meaning is still Great, that unless we can feel good about what we do, there is no Greatness in our actions, despite outward fame and glory. A Christian friend once found it incongruent how I can be so conservative yet not judgemental in my religious beliefs. And that for me is part of goodness, of being accountable to Him only no matter and soemtimes despite what others do. This post is about Someone by the way.

A person whom no one realises is great because he is too busy being Good. A person who cares and doesn't ask for caring back. A person who always has more to give. A person who now needs to be recognised because there is something wrong with the world if we don't recognise Goodness. A person who has so much person in him that I fear he might let it go to allow People in. Please, don't. We care for you and want you to keep your Person. Don't let us down ;) *jowk* And in true Khadija style, who has person and opinions enough to go around, and whose island I will always ambush, I leave you with words that shine with colour more than my waffling: "Greatness lies, not in being strong, but in the right using of strength."- Henry Ward Beecher (who is that btw?).

Hey I started blogging again :)

And what he has created in the earth of varied hues most surely there is a sign in this for a people who are mindful (16:13)

2009-07-13T23:55:00.008+02:00

The flora of Malawi and Namibia.

"There are so many colours in the rainbow,
so many colours in the morning sun,
so many colours in the flowers,
And I love Every One"
Dawud Wharnsby Ali

Tweaking

2009-07-13T20:23:00.000+02:00

Please excuse my overalls :)

Useless skin

2009-06-25T13:03:00.002+02:00

Mein ruh ist hin, Mein herz ist schwer