Scattered Pearls
So have ever looked at a strand of Pearls, how beautiful they look but that very strand of pearls when scattered everywhere looses its original beauty.. Sorta like noorified people, you can almost see the lack of noor or abundance at times on their faces. soo Maliha Balala my role model wrote this beautiful reply to a sister going through some very painful things in her life! May Allah(swt) keep our pearls intact.. ameen or grant us to be like those amazing strands of pearls.. God willing :)
Peace,
ayesha zafar
sigh...
i read this yesterday, and had to fight the tears that choked me...I came back today, hoping the story changed somewhat, maybe i read too much into it? surely this can't be? But then i thought back to the all the horrid stories i have heard growing up, all the not so nice things that adults like to cover, and we children somehow learn of. The perverted uncle, the alcoholic neighbor, the suicidal aunt, the molested cousins, the aborted baby... Somehow within the pristine outer appearances, we tend to hush these things (as a community)..maybe if we look away, they will dissappear, or atleast not haunt our dreams at night. A burden too heavy to share and seemingly too much to handle. But surely Allah is The All Merciful, All Compassionate? Surely He knows what you are going through and He who takes care of the minutest creatures, the most helpless of gnats and most vulnerable of ants...He who feeds the birds, He who causes the most beautiful heart rending of flowers to grow ever so slowly, ever so painfully, from a slab of concrete! In life we have two kindsa people, those who have been spoon fed, groomed, taken care of, those who have been given all the excesses of life...and on the outside they look sooo perrfect...sooo together...everyone wishes to have a bit of them..to just "be" them even for a second. Yet in the larger scheme of eternity only Allah knows where they truly stand, and just this morning i was thinking if Allah in His Wisdom and Mercy did not conceal our inner reality (and ugliness) then surely we would be running away from each other's grotesque-ness. I read in a poem, that the parable of these ever so perfect people are like the most beautiful and prim of roses, cut, preserved, and put in a gorgeous crystal vase. Everyone looks at it and gawks for a minute or longer....as it slowly whithers away. Then there is the majority of people. Those that grow up wondering what is the point of life? Those that never tasted a 7 course meal, or enjoyed the luxury of airconditioning and even a bed...the billions of people in third world countries whose needs are sooo basic and so mundane, it's enough to humble the most hardened of hearts. The people who have tasted true pain, the strugglers, the ones whose feet are sooo jagged, wounded, and cracked from the path that seems tooo sharp, too painful, the path that's enough to numb the tenderest of hearts. Yet amidst the ruins surrounding some of these people, amidst the concrete jungles, the slabs of rocky hearts, and dusty paths, emerges the most poignant, and heart shattering of the wildest and untamed roses. Those big, colorful petals that have tasted the incessant bitter salty breezes, those hardened thorns that grow out to spike all the dangerous envious ones threatening to cut them down, those hardened stems yet such supple inner sanctums they are yearning to burst forth with the Magnificence and sheer beauty of the One who Created them, and nurtured them sooo intimately and closely despite the madness without. You my dear are lucky to be amongs the wild sea roses of this dunya. You have tasted the bitterness, but deep within you know that light that shines ever so bright will never be dimmed. You know there is a way out and it's not Kufr (disbelief), it's not despair, it's not giving in to the madness but submitting to the Source of All Peace, All Love, All Happiness, and the Will of He who created you, and nurtured you and brought you to the fullness of the beauty and integrity of your being. Just keep turning to Him, even when you feel the ground burning into your forehead, keep your face down, begging pleading and in the most subtle of ways He will keep lightening your burdens, blowing those ever sooo healing of Breezes into the depths of your soul...as He gently draws you closer and closer all these fleeting trials will take wings like fluttering butterflies and glide away...as you gradually ascend into the realm of the Truely blessed and Blissful Ones.
May Allah illuminate your soul with His Ever Glowing Light and May He increase you in Patience, Compassion and integrity.. Please never let go..never give up..for shaytaan will forever try to distance you and draw you into the depths of misery and wretchedness.
Your sis in struggle,
Maliha B
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