November Rain

November Rain

Two

Water drips enchantingly like beads dropping to the floor from an untie necklace, splattering upon striking a hard surface. The zinc roof Hussin had salvaged from a junk yard 14 miles from his home now is badly rusted and stained. Tiny holes with various sizes are everywhere, scattering from one end to the other on that perforated sun shield which the shaft of dusty sunlight will be seeping through on hot sunny day, resembling a strand of light saber pointing sharp to the ground. That tiny cubicle covered by the roof had served Hussin for many years (half a century, more or less) and is the abode for Hussin, once. But now, the clean entrance that leads to his house is coated with grime and dirt – waiting for someone to sweep it away, just like it used to be. At one corner in his no-room house, a woman just septuagenarian as he is, lies statically flat and stares blankly to the splashing crystals that drenching from the wavy roof.

Nature is playing its melody outside. The sound of wind is so eerie that it brings together a massive gush of torrential rain. It is enormous. The sounds of clapping thunder, howling wind, tapping downpour and streaming water are so eclectic that somehow it is a reminiscent of an orchestra with its grandeur masterpiece, conducted meticulously by no one. Mumtaz – motionless on the floor, religiously listens to this song of God. She has been listening for more than a month now and yet she couldn’t remember how the lyric sounds like. Because the tunes keep changing everyday, she can’t cope to attend to it anymore.

She is helpless in her grubby robe, no shampoo smell but stinky and her stench is so sickening. Mumtaz just like that for weeks and she refuses to bath, change her clothing or even move to the lavatory for a session of pee. God loves her that her neighbors are so sympathetic that they give her foods and to some extent, feed her not to let her die, alone. Her lips utter the prayer just like Hussin does.

“Allah Thy Creator! Give me strength for Thou art Thy Beneficent, Thy Merciful. Show my son his way home if he is alive and wash the sins he had succumbed if he no more breathing. And if he is really died, I beseech upon you My God, Thy Greatest to show me his body, not to let him afloat in open sea”

Anger is not the feeling that bulging but the pain it is that pounding inside her heart. Such a long wait is so throbbing which every second that passes by is nothing but mere a lethal torture.

“Amma misses Rafeeq so much”, the unabashed tears pour again, she wipes and it leaks for one more time – and she counting (with a little bud of blooming hope) the day when she will see her son again.

The Contrast

The Contrast Sometimes it is so funny to think that our life is separated by just one thin line. Between living - breathing the air of a fresh cut grass on the lawn, or lying on bed, eyes closed shut with nothing in the head except an eerie flashes of images how does an afterlife will look like. Sometimes, it is not funny at all to being knocked on our head about all these things. All the life and death talks and jargons which aren't understandable at all. Sometimes we make ourselves to believe on this thing so we could be prepared for the worst and sometimes our faith is shaken badly we almost crumbled mortifying that this will not be happened, at all. Sometimes how hard we try to ditch and to deny this feeling out of our head, it is something that is destined to be happened, something that has been written on our book of life - before we could smell the fresh air of the green grass on the back of our lawn. It will be tormenting, it will be frightening, but how hard it would be, it is written and there will be nothing can be done except being accepting. Sometimes, when I sit on a bench on a late Saturday afternoon, I could be flown away like how do sky and solid ground could be separated by just one thin line. The green and the blank space of white dust. Just like how do life and death are.. Two distinguish worlds by one clear visible line. It is eerie. But that's how it is meant to be. Because sometimes, life is so lovely we don't want to know what will be happening next.

November Rain

November Rain - The Beginning

“Recite, in the name of the Lord thy Creator, who created Man from clots of blood”

One

“Praying again he is. I am being so indifferent while he keeps on standing on that jetty never wanting to let go his hopes. I wish I am that strong, bolted with courage to fight the terror”, a frantic note creeping into Kassim’s gravelly-yet-soothing voice.

“Our motivation has crumbled, my brother Kassim. It was long time ago, remember? Farid’s grieves had subsided, Kamal had rested his shoulder benevolently not to recall passing sorrows upon resurrected from the silent pain. Ameena gained her confidence in the swamp of uncertainties. Almost everyone had woke up not to mingle in the tormenting atmosphere we’d been living all these years”, Aziz sounds deep, restraining the throat from choking the air.

“May Allah shines His mercy on him and puff his exasperation away”, Kassim pats on Aziz’s broad shoulder and walk the path home his legs carry. Aziz catches Kassim’s stroll hastily with small steps not to fall down in the ill-lit uneven ground surface. Near dark it is that birds chirping piercingly – signaling to the others that they are resting, loaded with foods in their nest, enjoying the scene of the dusk with their offspring dancing to be fed. Every single soul on Earth is celebrating the feast to welcoming the night, the moment when all tendencies come to a point of union and contentment.

Hussin’s buttock glued to the soil-brown, tarnished wooden jetty. His bare feet nailed. The jetty is an old wrecked structure which pillars were erected 2-armspread from the shallow river base and the physical shape tatters it does not round anymore. The constant immersion in the water and the hardworking termites had ruined it gradually over time. They had abandoned the dock but Hussin never tried to. He barely moves from the spot he’s resting except for the time when he hears the appeasing voice of Munni calling for beseech to Allah – then he will slowly lift his weary torso down bit by bit to the steep cleavage of already-made stairs to the spot where he will banish the dust that covers him, where he will gargle, seep his whole furrowed face thoroughly, his bone-like hands, foreheads, part of his ears, and finish with a soak from ankle down to his toe – a few inches away from the tip of the Ganges River.

With the leftover energy he has, he will then clamber back up the steep, slippery cliff to his resting spot, straighten his noticeable septuagenarian body and devotedly encumbers in the God’s calling. Five times a day Hussin exuberantly do his undeniable obligation and he never failed once to perform since the very first day he was there until now, which makes the complete circle of a fortnight.

“O’ God, the most merciful and compassionate which from Thou I cometh and to Thou I shall rest, there’s no other God I shall beseech for it’s Thou that let me breathe. I pray upon you Thy Creator for I shall hope that my son is placed among the pure, for him to wash away the sins he’d commit. I pray for Thou Allah to free me from this burden that entangles, I pray for Thou Allah to send my Rafeeq home, I beseech upon….” and Hussin’s lethargic, melancholic prayer chanting endlessly until he wakes up to see himself being bathed by the hot India’s sunrays.