I wish to share with you guys tonight a gem of a performance. I came across it randomly and I have been listening to this all night. He is a renowned Pakistani Sufi singer Sain Zahoor Ahmad. He began singing at the young age of five under the eye of Ustad Sain Raunka Ali of Patiala. Sain Zahoor is unlettered, unable to read or write. But amazingly, he has memorized literally hundreds of Punjabi Sufi Kalams. Its been said that at his first stage performance at the All Pakistan Music Conference in 1989, he sent the crowd into a trance so intense that some people deemed his voice dangerous. I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I did. This was at the BBC World Music Awards 2006 where he recieved the award for the Asia/Pacific category.
I wonder sometimes if whether the longer a person takes to get over someone he/she loves when they lose them, does that person have a deeper ability to love than someone who takes less time? I mean to say, can that person feel love more than the average person? Are all feelings of love felt with the same intensity? With the same fire? I guess its an empirical question that can’t really be answered. But I suspect it to be true. I don’t know how or why (my theory is as good as anyone else’s). Its just a hunch that I have.
Here is another question: Does a person who fell in love deeply for the first time, and lost that person, feel the same (or greater) intensity of love with the second person they fall in love with? I guess time will tell…
Its 3.41am here and I can’t sleep. Hopefully when I go to bed now, my eyes will shut and allow me to escape this reality for a few hours.
Having a girl that you love that doesn’t love you back the same way, coming back into your life, even if its just for a few hours, a girl that you have been trying for years to get over, trying everything…even hating her for not reciprocating that love, a girl that you wish you never met because of all that she has put you through, a girl that makes you burn with jealousy, a girl who’s thoughts make your stomach sick, your legs numb, a girl who’s thoughts make the light shining on your face disappear. a girl who traps your soul in utter despair, a girl that you did everything for which was ultimately in vain…having a girl like that come back into your life, even if for just a few hours, is quite possibly one of the worst emotions you can ever go through.
That’s what I have been dealing with for the past few days….She kept asking why I am not excited to see her; why I am not talking to her…why I am being so quiet. She asked me if I was mad at her. I brushed her questions off as well as I could. I put on the best facade I could. There is no point.
They say it is better to have loved and lost than to not have loved at all. I think that is absurd. I wish I had never met this girl. I wish I had never loved her. I wish I was ignorant as to what love really is. It has all been in vain. I got nothing out of it. And now because of it, I am insecure, unhappy and not able to live up to my full potential. I am starting to ask questions about myself that I had never dreamed about asking (and that’s not a good thing). This has not made me stronger. It makes me weaker by the day. I have forgotten what it is like to be happy. I don’t even know if I can recognize happiness anymore. I am unable to sleep and even when I do sleep, I have horrid nightmares which make me scared to fall back asleep yet. Is this what love is?
Love is only good when it is good to you. If love is not good to you, it is one of the most wretched of cognitions.
Your colours intoxicate my eyes
Everywhere I look I see your colours
Colours of your beauty ring through me
You are the colours of my world
Your lips are my red
Your eyes are my green
Your hair is my black
Your skin is my gold
Your silk is my pink
Your bangles are my yellow
Your henna is my orange
Your necklace is my white
Subhanallah!
Praise be to Allah!
Glory be to thee!
Lord of all the worlds!
Only The God of this universe
Can make you my universe
Subhanallah!
Praise Be to Allah
Glory Be to Thee!
Lord of all the worlds!
The beauty of the stars
The gardens and mountains
The oceans and streams
All sing your name in unison
Only The God of this universe
Can make you my universe
Your smile is my sunrise
Your bindi is my sunset
Your voice is my song
Your touch is my heartbeat
Wrapped in your arms
I am wrapped in a rainbow
A rainbow of colours
Colours that are you
Surrounded by you
Colours dance, whirl, spin!
Colours intoxicate me
Colours become my wine
You are the colours that colour my world
Without you I go blind and become of nothingness
Colour me with your presence
Colour me with your love.
Love a seed and it so does turn into a garden
Love a droplet and it so does turn into an ocean
Love a ray of light and it so does turn into the day
Love me and I so do become The Lover of Lovers
Only The God of this universe
Can make you my universe
Your colours surround me
Adorn me so that I may see
The love that colours my world
Colours shall be your nature
Your colours intoxicate my eyes
Everywhere I look I see your colours
Colours of your beauty ring through me
You are the colours of my world
Why does reality suck so much? In my experiences, it doesn’t matter how good life is at the moment, its never as good as one wants it to be. There is always something, that one little thing that ruins it. As much as one works to control their circumstances, one is never able to live a truly peaceful, fulfilling life. That, I guess is the nature of reality. And by virtue of that, it is pretty much impossible to escape.
So the best way to get away from reality is to fantasize. Imagine a reality that is far from the one we experience – one where everything is perfect. A place where happiness and relief rule, where bliss is is sunlight and enchantment is moonlight. To me, right here at this time, the smile of this girl is what embodies all of this:
Her eyes and her smile are my escape. The fact that she is a child emboldens the look of shear happiness, clearly expressed in her eyes. Not a care or worry in the world blankets her face. Her pudgey cheeks give a sense of playfulness that only a child can express. Her hand resting on her chin indicates her intelligence but at the same time displays a level of chilaak-ness (sorry, I can’t translate chilaak into English) which you can see in both her eyes and in her smile. Freedom riegns in her reality. A perfect, innocent life.
That brings me ultimately to this thought. If I could wish for one thing, it would be my wish to go back to childhood – to be like the girl in the picture. Care free with no real accountability to anyone. The life of a child is truly the best reality has to offer. I say this for a few reasons. One, because a child does not realize reality wholly, they do not ponder it as much as an older person does. This can be attributed to the fact that they are young. They live for the moment because that moment is their reality. I have seen this first hands on the streets of Pakistan. My recent trip there allowed me to see the poorest of the poor. But the children…despite their deplorable conditions, they still looked like the girl in the picture. They still had this rush of resilience coursing through them. Despite having nothing, they still live as if they have everything. Second, a child’s worries can disappear in a matter of seconds. A child could fall down and get hurt but as soon as he or she finds something to distract him or her from the pain, a toy for example, all is forgotten. Reality for a child can change in a matter of seconds. This isn’t the case for young adults (I won’t use the word adult because I am not that old yet).
For me, this picture is my wish. I have considered ’sleeping forever’ as a wish but sleep implies dreams. And dreams are more often than not irrational, inconsistent and one doesn’t really have full control over their dreams. But it is a good second option. The life of a child is as close to a perfect reality as humans will ever get to. It is this false sense of escape that allows me to cope with this harshness of reality. An artificial sense of comfort and the idea that I too, was once a child for an unknown reason give me the energy to move on. Why? I have no idea.
In the darkness beneath the starry skies
I yearn for you.
In the coldness of this barren forest
I seek your warmth.
In the harshness of this haunting landscape
I desire your comfort.
Walking these lonely plains of this lonely planet
I wish for you.
Stepping on this cold dead earth
I long for your warmth.
The moon dances, and yet you do not show.
The stars sing, and yet you do not show.
The planets dream, and yet you do not show.
My heart craves, and yet you do not show.
As I walk through this dead meadow
Drunk with desire
Mad with passion
Sad with loss
I stumble to and fro.
This jealousy I have
will not go.
It burns
Chars the earth
Like the sands of Sindh.
Your heart has joined with a stranger’s
You have left me here to die.
And so it is
That in the darkness beneath the starry skies
As I walk through this meadow, dead
All I see is your eyes expressionless
Your heart indifferent
When you left my garden
The garden of love
I created
And named after you.
"In the West, Intellect is the source of life.
In the East, Love is the basis of life.
Through Love, Intellect grows acquainted with Reality,
And Intellect gives stability to the work of Love,
Arise and lay the foundations of a new world,
By wedding Intellect to Love."
"The secret divine my ecstasy has taught
I may convey if I have Gabriel's breath.
What can these stars tell me of my fate?
They are lost themselves in the boundless firmament.
The total absorption of thought and vision is life,
Scattered thought is selfhood's total death.
Pleasures of selfhood are a blessing of God,
Who makes me lose my awareness of myself.
With a pure heart, a noble aim, a poignant soul.
I care not for Solomon's wealth or Plato's thought.
The Prophet's 'Mairaj' has taught me that heaven
Lies within the bounds of human reach.
This universe, perhaps, is yet incomplete,
For I hear repeated sounds of "Be, And It Was."
Thy mind is ruled by the magic of the West,
Thy cure lies in the Fire of Rumi's faith.
It is he who has given my eyes a blissful vision,
It is he who has blessed my soul with light."
-Allama Iqbal
