**I share these words so that it may be known that we are human…**
**May the Almighty Allah bless us with hearts at peace with His decree.**
I wept for her when illness overtook her,
and I wept for her even more when death took her away.
Then I wept for all the years of my life after her,
whenever her image crossed my mind,
or longing called me by her name.
I miss her—not as people usually miss someone,
but as one misses safety when it is gone.
I miss her love,
a love that asked for nothing in return;
her counsel,
which never wounded;
and her voice…
that voice which alone
was enough to silence all my fears.
The Almighty Allah decreed that I should spend a lifetime
learning the meaning of loss far too early.
My mother passed away to be with our Lord
when I was only five.
I grew up with a prayer that had been cut short.
Then you followed her,
my children’s mother,
when I was forty.
My back was broken,
yet I remained standing,
pretending to make peace with life.
And today, having passed seventy,
I no longer count the years;
I count the absences.
And at last I understand
that some losses are never forgotten,
even when patience teaches the heart to live with them.
May the Almighty Allah envelop you in His boundless mercy,
and reunite me with you,
with my mother,
and with our fathers and mothers,
our brothers and sisters,
and all those who preceded us in faith,
in Gardens beneath which rivers flow,
in the presence of a Sovereign Omnipotent.
And we say nothing but what pleases Allah:
**Indeed, we belong to Allah,
and indeed, to Him we shall return.**
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