Remembrance
Today I went to a place where just a month ago there was a death or it
will be fit to say martyrdom.
People greeted us like they always do, with a smile. There was laughter when after a long dua, the daughter of the deceased added that may all the students get good results. There was cordial banter and yet there was a lingering silence.
A powerful one.
Maybe the voices around me were hushed though I know they weren't, but that's the only reason that can make sense of that heavy stillness that laid around me. For long I waited for him to appear, with that contented smile that always graced his face.
I was left waiting.
The only relieve from it was when his son walked in; his eldest son. For a moment it felt like it was him.
He looked exactly like his father.
The way he sat, the way he dressed and the way his eyes seemed to look far beyond what was present and clear.
He was just a little more youthful, not ridden with the many diseases that had housed themselves in his belated father. Other than that, they looked exactly alike, as if his father's features had settled into his son's appearance: immortalization.
I went and looked at his grave and it was peaceful, as peaceful as his presence used to be. Isn't it weird that I know what his aura felt like during his life when I have met him only a handful of times since my birth, and that only for just a couple of minutes in each meeting? I remember clearly how even in his old age he used to rush to the mosque in his white, starched kurta, making a fresh wudu even before the call of prayers was heard from the minarets and he used to pull my father along. I had an urge to go and look in the room where he used to entertain us to see if it was the same but as his son said, " Everything is like before. Look around!"
Everything was like before except the ripples of air or Noor or maybe the wraith projected from my mind in places that I distinctly remember him standing.
Near his grave there was a fresh mound of sand heaped in a barrow and I wanted to burrow my hand in it. I know it would have been warm had I felt it. I just wanted to touch the same soil that must have touched his body-my belated farewell. There was something that held me there, some force of attraction cause never have I had the need for my mother to steer me, and despite knowing that she was trying, I couldn't help but look back, till last of the place faded from view.
People greeted us like they always do, with a smile. There was laughter when after a long dua, the daughter of the deceased added that may all the students get good results. There was cordial banter and yet there was a lingering silence.
A powerful one.
Maybe the voices around me were hushed though I know they weren't, but that's the only reason that can make sense of that heavy stillness that laid around me. For long I waited for him to appear, with that contented smile that always graced his face.
I was left waiting.
The only relieve from it was when his son walked in; his eldest son. For a moment it felt like it was him.
He looked exactly like his father.
The way he sat, the way he dressed and the way his eyes seemed to look far beyond what was present and clear.
He was just a little more youthful, not ridden with the many diseases that had housed themselves in his belated father. Other than that, they looked exactly alike, as if his father's features had settled into his son's appearance: immortalization.
I went and looked at his grave and it was peaceful, as peaceful as his presence used to be. Isn't it weird that I know what his aura felt like during his life when I have met him only a handful of times since my birth, and that only for just a couple of minutes in each meeting? I remember clearly how even in his old age he used to rush to the mosque in his white, starched kurta, making a fresh wudu even before the call of prayers was heard from the minarets and he used to pull my father along. I had an urge to go and look in the room where he used to entertain us to see if it was the same but as his son said, " Everything is like before. Look around!"
Everything was like before except the ripples of air or Noor or maybe the wraith projected from my mind in places that I distinctly remember him standing.
Near his grave there was a fresh mound of sand heaped in a barrow and I wanted to burrow my hand in it. I know it would have been warm had I felt it. I just wanted to touch the same soil that must have touched his body-my belated farewell. There was something that held me there, some force of attraction cause never have I had the need for my mother to steer me, and despite knowing that she was trying, I couldn't help but look back, till last of the place faded from view.
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