As for the earth, We spread it out and placed upon it firm mountains, and caused everything to grow there in perfect balance (Quran 15:19)
— English by Dr. Mustafa Khattab, the Clear Quran
Balance
Eid-Al-Fitr Mubarak 2022
Another Ramadan has come and gone. A sure sign of the relentless passing of time. As always, it’s been a time of trials and tribulations. Of sincere prayers and deep reflections. A time of lucid late evenings and tired early mornings. And, as always, a time of failure and of success.
Today, on the eve of the last day of this holy month, I pray that I get to experience another opportunity to seek the ultimate benefits of my prayers together with my loved ones yet again.
May Allah accept our attempts in the month that has passed, and grant us the opportunity to improve our efforts in the future. I wish all Muslims a happy and blessed Eid al-Fitr!
Thanks
Thanks for sharing all your stories, big and small. Thanks for always coming through, and for surprising me when I least expect it. Thanks for your patience even in moments of stress. Thanks for always trying, and for your friendship.
Snow
Pure, fresh, pristine.
Having arrived just a few hours before,
it was waiting for us as we stood at the trailhead.
A clean white carpet draped on the forest floor,
inviting us in.
And we walked.
Hard as rock. And unforgivingly slippery.
Treacherous under a thin blanket of powder.
One misstep and we’d be on our backs.
We kept walking.
Brittle as glass.
Cracking easily under the weight of our steps like fine china.
A crisp ripping sound in the muffled forest air,
and then quiet.
We pressed on.
Soft, as the finest Egyptian cotton.
Cushioning our feet as if walking on puffs of cloud,
high above the forest floor.
We continued walking.
White turned gray and then black
as the day surrendered to dusk and then night.
Darkness descended upon us,
erasing the difference between the ground and the sky.
Like walking in nothingness,
the only sound we heard was the one of our own breathing,
and our footsteps on the black snow.
And we kept walking.
The Dreams We Never Had
Sometimes in life, we have dreams.
Some can be achieved if we work really hard,
pray from our hearts,
and are fortunate enough to have just that extra bit of fate on our side.
Some are so big, we know they’ll always be outside our reach.
Yet we hope, and we pray.
And we carry them inside us, safeguarding them as the years pass by.
Sometimes in life dreams come true.
It may not be the ones we expected,
or knew even existed.
We find ourselves on top of a mountain we never climbed.
The First Day of Spring
Today, after weeks of low temperatures caused by Siberian winds from the East, the snow finally gave in to the warmth of the March sun. From afar, the droplets from the melting snow on the roof seemed to be falling lazily onto the wooden railing on top the fence below.
As March 1st, the first day of spring, was just a few days ago, I wanted to capture this sign of the coming season so I got my camera to get a close-up of the droplets hitting the railing. What looked like a calm trickle from a distance, turned out to be tiny explosions up close. Every time a drop hit the surface of the railing, it shattered into a thousand droplets spraying the surrounding air, creating a dazzling spectacle of small eruptions of water backlit by the brilliant afternoon sun.
Winter’s Sunset
There’s something wonderfully sad about a winter’s sunset.
It deadens the pain, the melancholy of regret.
A fleeting moment of calm surrender.
And ephemeral beauty.
Captured in an instant.
Forever preserved.
In the vast darkness of my heart.
A tiny light deserved