As another dusk approached, I was there again on my terrace watching the heavens change their colors and the birds go back home. There is a bizarre link between man and the manifestations of nature, a subtle harmony, I thought. Whenever I am sad, I go up to my terrace alone at dusk and stay there till darkness engulfs all. I call this the “routine periodic melancholy.”
It was one of those melancholy evenings and when I reached that particular place, I fell my entity being drowned in ice-cold water. It was an inexplicable hollowness, as if some part of me had suddenly become void, vacant, and vacuous. I stood frozen, bewildered. It fell as if some unknown force was wringing my heart and draining even the last drop of blood out of it.
And then she came before my eyes, her fragrance; her warmth-I could feel it all! It felt as if she had never died, as if her death was all a dream-a terrible dream-and I wondered, how strange it is that although everyday, we hear about deaths, blasts, tragedies yet when someone very dear dies, it feels beyond reality, beyond logic; some fog, some dream, a mist, a haze! With that a tsunami of WHYS, IFS and BUTS came in my mind.
It seems just yesterday when khala lay in the ICU of the Oncology Department. Those four days were the hardest of my life. How can I ever forget her state of deep coma-no sense of hunger, pain and thirst, no recognition of dear ones-a blatant resignation to the dictates of fate, helplessness like that of an infant and above all, the doctors telling, “dua karain, bohat mushkil he.”
Something in me had told me that she won’t live long but I didn’t pay heed to such voices. With eyes full of tears, I kissed her feet, her hands, and her arms that had held me in infancy. With that came a flood of reminiscences. How we laughed together at the most weird things, how she would catch me at my words, how I would empty the long suppressed tears on her shoulder, how just one word of hers “Aaish!” would make me feel so good, how much she admired my poetry and would often say “I smell a rat in your verses” and I would just smile. Ah…that’s life!
She was my best friend, my sister, my mother, my fairy. She would often say in the most affectionate manner, “I pray for your destiny to be as shining as the stars.” I was reciting Surah Al-Fatiha besides her bed when with eyes still closed, she raised her hand a little and said in what seemed like a whisper, “Aaishah!” I jumped to my feet and took her hand in mine. That was the last word she said during her coma. I came back to Sargodha, my home at 2.30 pm to prepare for my final university exam the very next day and decided to return to the hospital in Islamabad soon after the exam was over. But how very tactless we are, before His throne.
“You plan and Allah also plans and surely, He is the best of planners.”(Al-quran) At 3.30 pm my cousin was telling me on the phone that khala had left us. I screamed, “No you’re lying! Where is she? Tell me!” and there she was, wrapped in a white coffin with a rosy smile on her lips. After a long fight with cancer, she was at last, at ease!
I has vowed to myself not to complain “God! Why her?” and now came the time of fulfilling my vow. With tears in my eyes, I lay down my head in prostration and said:
How helpless we are before You, how very helpless! Thy will be done, my Lord! As always, Thy will be done!
It was one of those melancholy evenings and when I reached that particular place, I fell my entity being drowned in ice-cold water. It was an inexplicable hollowness, as if some part of me had suddenly become void, vacant, and vacuous. I stood frozen, bewildered. It fell as if some unknown force was wringing my heart and draining even the last drop of blood out of it.
And then she came before my eyes, her fragrance; her warmth-I could feel it all! It felt as if she had never died, as if her death was all a dream-a terrible dream-and I wondered, how strange it is that although everyday, we hear about deaths, blasts, tragedies yet when someone very dear dies, it feels beyond reality, beyond logic; some fog, some dream, a mist, a haze! With that a tsunami of WHYS, IFS and BUTS came in my mind.
It seems just yesterday when khala lay in the ICU of the Oncology Department. Those four days were the hardest of my life. How can I ever forget her state of deep coma-no sense of hunger, pain and thirst, no recognition of dear ones-a blatant resignation to the dictates of fate, helplessness like that of an infant and above all, the doctors telling, “dua karain, bohat mushkil he.”
Something in me had told me that she won’t live long but I didn’t pay heed to such voices. With eyes full of tears, I kissed her feet, her hands, and her arms that had held me in infancy. With that came a flood of reminiscences. How we laughed together at the most weird things, how she would catch me at my words, how I would empty the long suppressed tears on her shoulder, how just one word of hers “Aaish!” would make me feel so good, how much she admired my poetry and would often say “I smell a rat in your verses” and I would just smile. Ah…that’s life!
She was my best friend, my sister, my mother, my fairy. She would often say in the most affectionate manner, “I pray for your destiny to be as shining as the stars.” I was reciting Surah Al-Fatiha besides her bed when with eyes still closed, she raised her hand a little and said in what seemed like a whisper, “Aaishah!” I jumped to my feet and took her hand in mine. That was the last word she said during her coma. I came back to Sargodha, my home at 2.30 pm to prepare for my final university exam the very next day and decided to return to the hospital in Islamabad soon after the exam was over. But how very tactless we are, before His throne.
“You plan and Allah also plans and surely, He is the best of planners.”(Al-quran) At 3.30 pm my cousin was telling me on the phone that khala had left us. I screamed, “No you’re lying! Where is she? Tell me!” and there she was, wrapped in a white coffin with a rosy smile on her lips. After a long fight with cancer, she was at last, at ease!
I has vowed to myself not to complain “God! Why her?” and now came the time of fulfilling my vow. With tears in my eyes, I lay down my head in prostration and said:
How helpless we are before You, how very helpless! Thy will be done, my Lord! As always, Thy will be done!
(This pic is hers-fresh and beautiful, as the morning dew,a few months before she was diagnosed with Cancer. May her soul rest in peace.)
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