Sol 6

  1. ، !

    Radiance has chosen you, and brilliance has selected you.

    How, then, could a clot rise to the level of your creation?

  2. O imprint of God across the reaches of His planet,

    where space is a book and the vast expanse is its pages.

  3. ()

    Deep within Amina’s womb, you were not

    merely flesh growing and taking shape upon bone.

  4. Rather, you were a deeper, sacred mystery

    than a drop stirring in the waters of creation.

  5. ،

    A mystery wraps you in another mystery, and still

    the circle of mysteries closes around you.

  6. ()،

    () !

    Open it, for I am a Companion in standing,

    the equal of the Companions, except that they came first.

  7. ..

    !

    I pledged allegiance to your memory, and my neck yielded to it;

    for a true pledge is not made by twisting a neck.

  8. ()

    ،

    Here, Hassan’s praises are upon my lips,

    flourishing, while a trace of his life remains in my soul.

  9. ( )

    O you who climbed the Mountain of Light, from which

    truth descended and set forth across the earth.

  10. ()

    We returned to you, tracing our way through history,

    as far as Hira, but the roads would take us no farther.

  11. ؟!

    Where is the path along which your footsteps flowed

    like a river surging across the desert’s heart?

  12. In days when the days had lost their way,

    no step could trust itself anymore.

  13. ..

    !

    The landscape weeps; no spirit lulls it

    except the winds slipping through bewilderment.

  14. ،

    Time has dried up of meaning; no purpose remains

    for which its hours race ahead.

  15. Everyone searches for where their truth may appear,

    but on the horizon are only fear and anxiety.

  16. ()

    :

    Whenever the guides sang of the Peninsula’s sands,

    the sand nearly choked on the echoes.

  17. ؟

    !

    Who will heal the essence within the human being?

    The question nearly burned upon the desert.

  18. :

    News drew its bow taut for a momentous announcement,

    with the arrow’s joy as it springs free:

  19. From beyond the earth, God extended His palm

    toward life, and joy and brilliance overflowed.

  20. ()

    He chose Mecca as a vessel for His mercy;

    one bowl had scarcely been filled before another longed for it.

  21. !

    A flood of kindness whose truth was not grasped

    by people choking on the overflow of their own illusions.

  22. ..

    :

    Until the unseen unveiled its secret, and then

    the voice of truth burst forth across the horizons:

  23. ..

    Good news for life: a helmsman, through whom

    the maps came together and the roads yielded.

  24. ().. ()

    ؟!

    Taha—and who but Taha, when the ship of creation calls him,

    can keep it safe from drowning?

  25. ،

    O rose of truth, we still share with it

    the secret of its fragrance, and the scent colors our souls.

  26. From deep within our loins, unborn drops greeted you,

    rejoicing as water and clot swayed within them.

  27. ،

    The vessel of memory led us to a time

    on whose two shores love and good character raised you.

  28. ()

    ،

    Did Halima know, when her milk flowed,

    that one day dawn would rise from her breasts?

  29. ( ) ..

    !

    She moved forward among the nursing women of Banu Saad,

    while hatred and resentment walked behind her steps.

  30. !!

    What could touch her, when eternity had given her

    a river brimming and spilling over with blessings?

  31. O self-effacing one, you even chose sleeplessness

    so that slaves worn thin by sleeplessness might rest.

  32. ..

    ..

    The wound of prophethood is the sun’s wound;

    the spirit of beauty dwells in it, and twilight is one of its names.

  33. ..

    ().. !

    From your seclusion, from a sorrow you bore alone

    in the cave, from a foreboding that set anguish ablaze;

  34. ( ) ..

    !

    from a well of water where the shepherds’ dream withered,

    from a tent where rashness and recklessness ran wild;

  35. ..

    .. !

    from all that darkness, your eyes shone in revolt,

    and history began to gleam.

  36. In your hands the earth was joined to its hoe,

    until roses and basil multiplied from it.

  37. ،

    The dream awoke, proud of its rider;

    the eye of the world enfolds and embraces him.

  38. You appeared in the procession of divine oneness, drawing

    a sword you would draw for nothing but guidance.

  39. You recited your radiant psalms, and there arose

    upon the echo the panting steeds of truth, racing ahead.

  40. ..

    You carried the most radiant torch into a dark,

    pitch-black night through whose reaches dusk groped.

  41. ،

    For your horse, in place of water and fodder, there sufficed

    the breath of its panting at its jaws, and sweat.

  42. ..

    ،

    Forgive me, Prophet of guidance, forgive me if my anguish

    crosses the bridge of verse into your paradise.

  43. ، :

    And forgive my words if you see their seed

    split open into a plant of complaint:

  44. ..

    !

    Your memory nearly chokes on its own lights,

    a sun for which no horizon is wide enough.

  45. !

    A fleet of dawn lies hidden beyond the unseen;

    souls and eyes are too crowded for its harbor.

  46. ،

    How can I reach you in intimate speech, when that speech keeps me awake

    to the point of torment, and its horizon around me is a tunnel?

  47. :

    !

    I tell you: this universe is still a court

    that orders the hands of those who did not steal to be cut off.

  48. And the wound in humanity’s essence still has

    blood flowing as widely as the earth.

  49. Take heart: how often you tried to stitch it

    with miracles, yet it will not close.

  50. !

    Your thread has never doubted its needle

    since those who cut and tore widened the wound.

Sol 6