Photo: Jason Mrachina

By Zaheen Uddin

Sitting here, waiting, waiting for epiphany to strike.

Thinking in reflection, sinking in perplexion

Mind winds up, thoughts line up, time winds down understanding hikes

Sensation is in elation, reverberation in air particles’ perception

Suddenly everything is in slow motion.

Because logic, reasoning and problem-solving ability

Are clearer than a summer sky that knows no notion

Of a straggling cloud in the celestial sea of tranquility

Abstract materializes, realizes the vices

Of the hidden within that were veiled before

Synesthesia of the mind makes sounds dance in colorful silence

Violet vox, turquoise trills, lavender lore

Black and white are dark as the day, bright as the night

When shadows are cast behind and the eye of the night outshines the rest

And dark distinguishes danger from delight

With an inner eye that foresees beyond light of the West

Because the evanescent sun extracts the last tracks of day

In between gone and here it is a phantasmagoric sphere

Giving a clear criterion of what is on land and what remains at bay

Beyond which an unconscious ocean is near, so clear

Pristine it appears, but here, not a ray of light shines down

Complex in its contents, deep in darkness

Creatures deep within it are fatefully bound

By the confines of the abysmal harness

Deeper and deeper I plunge within

Pressure strengthens as complex composition concentrates

Steeper and steeper I delve into sin

Wetter, better yet more fettered as it palpitates

Blind now, deaf of sound and unable to comprehend

Light seems impossible in a place where hope dies

Empty, yet so heavy, there seems to be no end

To the evil, the deception, the ineptness, the lies

I crawl myself out with no known avail

It’s too damp and too dark to try

If only I had never set out to subconsciously sail!

At this point it’s so damp I can’t even cry

Too much thinking, too deep, abstract

The window of opportunity is long past gone

I’m lost, I lost black, I’m trapped

The perceptive lights that were once bright are no longer on.

I close my eyes to my impending doom.

I give up, forfeit, let the tides take me

Out of the ocean, out of the sky I zoom

Into the singularity of my soul, and it breaks me.

Silence, solitude, severance and sadness

Nothing, null, nada, naked

I’m left alone in the centroid of madness

Rotten, forgotten, hated, forsaken.

“Awaken,”  I hear a voiceless voice say

Within me, around me, surrounds me, intimately

Eyes flash open, body is frozen; I lay

On the bay. I once was in close proximity, infinitely

Ecstatic, erratic, emphatic tears wet my face

Once drier than the most monochromatic and mundane

Who brought me here, where was that place?

And how did I get back to the higher plane?

I knew the answer, yet I didn’t.

Closer to me than my jugular vein,

I felt my pulse, it beat to the rhythm

Of the universe’s call inside the walls of my brain.

Within me, about me, without me, intricately

Designing and planning a masterful plan

Refining and aligning, as I am so insolently

Denying, lying, and crying towards my hands

“Truth was made clear and falsification has left,”

Said once a noble amongst mankind

And the same I say after once being bereft

Of the blessing that was graced by the divine.

That man, that mercy, that messenger, that martyr,

Was a part of my heart, from end, from start

I remember his message, from a life that was harder

Than the toils upon which any one of us embark.

His message was this:  “Whatever is willed is never to miss

And whatever misses you was never to hit.”

And “Glad tidings to the righteous of perpetual bliss”,

And “Whatever wrong is against your soul, and good is merit.”

I remember this, and the ember’s hiss also known as desire

Dies down until the illumination of what surrounds

Stops flashing about and what was once furious fire

Is now doused by the waters to douse what’s aroused

Arise from the mist, determined, clenched fist

I realize my purpose in earnest and my wish

And the voice that was voiceless yet I so dearly missed…

Was one I always knew, true as the sea’s blue; I know this.

It wasn’t far, it was always near.

I just couldn’t hear, with my fingers in my ears

So close, so great, so compassionate, so dear

In my darkest moments, do You truly appear.

And so I want to remember You

Wherever I am, if I’m planning a plan You are planning too

With love unmatched I cry tears true

Because of fear, love, trust and weakness of man

You are the Friend I never knew

But always there, for eternity

No matter how dark it is, I can still see You

God, my God, you are always sought internally

Today though… everywhere…

will I look for You.