Drifting Off

DRIFTING OFF

As I lay awaiting sleep

Thoughts within my mind

Begin to creep

The pains of the day

Have dug deep

 

Sorrows expressed, one by one

hopes lost, other tests begun

will the next news

leave me all alone

 

as each conversation, I recall

into place, the pieces fall

each sorrow is answered

with a tale of joy

a hope, a promise

a prayer doth call

 

The scales of the world

Weigh heavy today

Towards the darkness and those

who've lost their way

So easy it would be to allow it to hold its sway

 

The time has come to reach out

Grab hope and shout

The light of two, greater than one

the spreading of hope hath begun

 

though the sorrows expressed to me

still linger to a small degree

It is the hope from one to another

That permits me to be at ease

 

As I drift off and away

Soon to face another day

Hope and joy will show the way

And on the morrow

When darkness loom

A new flower of hope will bloom

And day by day will show

An ever expanding garden doth grow

-Shiidon, November 2008

This poem is the result of two events.  The struggle of a friends in healing and the ups and downs of the conversations with customers and friends over the last week.

It has been a bit since my last posting.  There has been much going on and it has been at times overwhelming.  Just after the doctors had to go into my head and do their work, it was time for them to go into the one of my closest and dearest friends.  For some time now I have watched the miracles of life and what amazes me is how much we take for granted.  For example, as serious as things were for him, I have almost never seen him more happy than the two weeks before surgery.  The second test was to be told "don't tell anyone."  Yikes.  Well the other miracles started happening.  People would come into the story that had not been present for some time and would find out with the understanding that prayers were needed and hope.  Slowly a network of friends, community, family and business associates grew.  The time came for the surgery.  I watched the election of a new President.  From that morning to the time I woke up the next morning the surgery was ongoing.  It was 22 hours of what had to be the most complicated and meticulous work imagined.  That day a phone call arrived threatening to leave me alone.  Emails went out for more prayers and by that night the most glorious phone call arrived, it was a very exhausted voice, a voice I was told I might not hear again, saying "Alláh-u-Abhá. (God is the Most Glorious)"  While I trust in God, it is the uncertainty of what is His will in any given situation that makes it difficult at times for me.  The amount of love and prayers that went out for my dear friend were truly inspiring.  From the Shrines in the Holy Land, to friends and family all over the World the waves and waves of prayers and good thoughts were sent in his direction.  I look forward to spending time with my dear friend and his family.  In two weeks it is Thanksgiving in the United States.  This year i have something special to give thanks for.

I have cried a lot these past days and recently tears of joy.  Each day at work I am seeing the results of more and more tests and difficulties being heaped on my fellow human, brother sister.  We still somehow find a way to turn the conversation to more positive things and in doing so, make the day that much better.  If we leave an interaction with another in either a positive or negative way it effects the way we approach others for that day.  We are able to either bring a ray of sunlight or add to the despondency that is threatening like clouds of doom all around.  I truly believe that the warmth of each heart connecting will eventually burn off those clouds that are looming over all of us today.

One last note.  This dearest and closest friend shares another interesting thing with me.  The photograph on this post is of my grandfather in Kashan, Iran early last century.  He is the one in the center with a circle around him.  One person over and down is my dear friends grandfather.  I recently discovered this photos significance in that two generations ago his grandfather and mine were in the same community.  They probably never had any idea that their grandsons would be good friends and work together.