“Ramadan”
Updated: Dec 31, 2020

I didn’t see the moon last night.
Hovering over Mecca in its steady light.
But, someone out there did.
Someone saw the moon over our eyelids,
While the gates to God’s house on Earth¹ were empty
For the first time in our muted memory.
The air’s muffled wails echo around the fallen meteorite²,
Chasing ghosts of pilgrims who revered the site,
Remembering revelation³
From a time lost well into the sands and locust shells.
There are eyes spilling past the square’s cement foundation
And faded dusty sighs trudging over the desert to silent knells
To the vast nothingness where we owe our creation.
Past the Arab desert someone knew.
Someone: an ancestor dreaming beyond subsoil dew
Grazing the empty space before “then”
The time before time rests on the hands of Al-Khabir (The All Aware).
Allah: existing everywhere before there was a where.
Streets are hushed. But, the long lines awaken,
Gathering at the gates to the liminal pavilion.
Eyes above the surface watch over the overflowing empty
And the faded dusty sigh of the receding tides sink
Down to the vast nothingness, farther than we can see,
So low, the fish will never see the moon beyond diluted ink.
Not many people see the moon either,
Pulling sighs into the receding water.
But upon the moon’s sighting, someone was waiting
To call the holy month’s beginning
With mere patient breaths before Isha’s⁴ adhan⁵,
The prayer for when the cold within our bones is tightly drawn.
I didn’t see the end tonight.
But someone did.
Footnotes:
The Kaaba is Islam’s most sacred site. It’s also referred to as بَيْت ٱللَّٰه ("House of God")
The Black Stone is a meteorite set into the corner of the Kaaba
Revelation of the Quran
Isha is the nighttime prayer out of the 5 daily prayers
The adhan announces the beginning of each prayer
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