Heart

Salam,

Mustafa here again. It's time to turn down the satire a bit and tap into the heart.

Because when it really comes down to it, that's all that there really is. Muslims are like hearts to one another. We feel each other beating, and when one heart is ill, the other heart aches. Sometimes our hearts ache with other things. Myself, I feel it all the time. Even in Egypt, so far away from time, trying to achieve my dreams, I still get envious when I hear about the achievments of others. I still get angry or irritable when I think about people I dislike or have disagreements with, and that's almost ludicrous if you think about it.

Another thing is the homesickness. One thing that's almost never mentioned by people who come from Egypt or Syria or what have you ever mention the homesickness. What exactly is this feeling? I mean, there's no conscious area; we just feel the pain. Sorry if my writing gets a bit jumbly here, but we're talking a language of the heart that my language skills are not up to describing. Sometimes I wish I could leave Egypt and just come home for a day. Just spend a day with Ami and Abu and the family. But I guess that's the way it's sometimes meant to be. We have to make sacrifices in order to make gains.

When I was younger, I guess I didn't understand that as well. I wished to have everything; play, leisure, happy days, high marks, achievments, my 15 minutes of fame, and ten hours of sleep. Now I'm starting to realize that they are "the things dreams are made of". What we get is proportional to the amount of work we put in and the amount that Allah helps us with.

I hope my writing isn't hypocritical, and I know it sometimes, "lacks depth, lacks worth/ lacks the distance to travel between heaven and earth" ect, but I hope it conveys what I feel. And here's a word from Tennyson's Ulysses:

I am a part of all that I have met;...

Come, my friends.'
T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down;
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,
--One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

-Bismillah

Mustafa