Eyelashes' Broom
 
If for the sake of Beloved, you said, you did [1] 
Grand! Whatsoever you said, Grand! Whatsoever you did
 
Why I am bothering with the scolding rocks of others hitting my love
Whomsoever is a Majnoon recompensed by the crushing of the skull [2]
 
How many more times telling the story of Job, enough! [3] 
We have no more patience than this, that was Job not us
 
Would possibly Majnoon be a self-centered hypocrite towards Leylie [4]
Lying amidst the need for messengers and love letters indeed 
 
I know not where this love and affection comes from [5]
Just know this much, desire gravitates from the Beloved
 
Behold the phenomenon: Joseph in dungeons of Egypt
Feet chained in jail, but in the heart of Jacob he lives [6] 
 
Haiti: [7]
 
How did the sorrow of eyelashes sieve the blood out of the tears? [8]
Remember the day when the broom swept them out of someone’s way!
 

 
 
[1] That day when Beloved loves you, and no one has any say on why the Majesty loves you and not someone else, that day no matter what you say, truth lies soft or harsh and no matter what you do, good evil wise or stupid… From that day on all you say and do shall turn into the best grandest results. As Araqi said, the bent of the bow shall make straight the flight of arrow i.e. even in our crookedness (bent of the bow) the end shall be straight and good (like a straight arrow’s flight). If you are a goody-two-shoes person fooling yourself believing that it is your false goodness bringing about the love of the Creator, you need to reconsider. Beloved loves you independent of who you are and what you do; there is no other truth. And under the shade of that love whatsoever you say and do, whether good or evil shall result in blossoms of Allah’s love. And the fragrance of these blossoms shall lure more and more towards the Beloved to be loved. Even when you have ceased and your biological functions desisted still the fragrance of your love bequeathed for future generations.
 
[2] Majnoon and Leily were Arabs, though his real name was Qays, and he lived in the Umayyad period. The story was given some of its best expressions by Persian (and also Ottoman) poets, but they were Arabs. The tragedy is similar to the western Romeo and Juliet. The poet says why to bother listening to the critics of people around us, when no matter who and what you love, the reward is nothing but your head bashed like Majnoon. Save your energy instead of convincing people, for better more loving.
 
[3] Prophet Job was a biblical prophet who was stricken with fatal ailment and poverty. Amongst the Muslims he is the symbol of patience and gratitude. Iranians have legends of this man being so sick that the maggots were eating him alive but never complained to Allah. Until Allah send him a spring to drink from and he was healed (Koran [38:42-44]. Allah gave back to him all his family plus more loved ones. In colloquial Farsi “Ayyub’s patience” is to mean being very patient (Ayyub is Arabic for Job).
 
[4] As Picasso once quoted a Spanish proverb (1923):
 
“Love must be proved by facts and not by reasons. What one does counts and not what one had the intention of doing.”
 
I believe Wahshi says the same. He tells us that intentions of Majnoon judged by his actions i.e. love letters sent by messengers paying them monies and risking his life and what not. Had Majnoon been a liar would he do/continue that for years? No! He would not. He would have chased another woman.
 
[5] Tell me! And tell me now! Why the children in the picture pulled towards the white American woman? Why does this affluent woman wasting her time with HIV infected poor children of Haiti hated/forsaken by most Americans and African Americans? Like Wahshi, I also do not know the answer. But I know, that pull of gravity is from Beloved the Creator of all things. Look at the emaciated arms of the kids on the bed like a magnet pulling towards another magnet (her). That pull is love and all we know about that is one thing: originates from Beloved.
 
[6] Ah! I want to write day in and day out about this phenomenon. My love gone forever, her feet have broken by the chains of this lowly word but she lives opulent in the palace of my heart. I do not understand where this love comes from, all I know is… it comes from the Beloved The Majesty.
 
Just like Joseph this children are kept in the prison of hospital beds with bars, guards and AIDS as the executioner. But they, for real, live in the hearts of their dead parents and the woman in the picture. I am sure by now, where my pen writes with such mighty arrogance, these children are dead and gone but their beauty preserved, just like this photograph, in the hearts of people who love them.
 
What ‘pulled’ this white woman to leave the comforts of her life in US and go to this forsaken Haiti and nurse these children whom will not last that long any way? I do not know what pulled her, but I know the source is the Beloved and nothing else I know about this.
 
Prophet Jacob was the father of Joseph. Both biblical figures lived around Egypt. Joseph was in jail but his love was living in the heart of his father who was told of him being dead. You may read the entire story here just click on this line…
 
[7] The word Wahshi, the name of the poet, was replaced by Haiti. Funny they rhyme!
 
[8] Sufis cry blood for the Beloved. But Wahshi sees no blood in his tears because the eyelashes filtered them away or like a broom swept them. He goes further saying all these melancholy and sorrow should be balanced by this thought: You were and soon will be again dust on someone’s path swept away…



Background:
A volunteer from the United States of America holds an HIV-infected child at a centre run by the Missionaires de la Charité in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

© 2003-2002,  Dara Shayda