You know those days
When you feel bizarre uneasiness within?
It's not nausea;
Although you wish throwing up would help
Or a glass of lemonade would ease.
It's not a rumbling tummy or a throbbing headache
Though it seems to partially linger in your head.
It's not something that can be healed
With activated charcoal or a dose of paracetamol
You can't bring yourself to work,
Neither physically nor mentally
Although it's not your body that hurts
Neither your heart, brain or any of the organs
You can sense it's something else
But what else is there to hurt?
And although you rest when you fall in sujood and stay there,
It can't seem to heal.
Perhaps you're just not devoted enough
You cannot bring yourself it, you just fail to
Like all your other endeavours
Or you just don't have the words to seek Allah's help
So, you just lie there shrivelled
Like a feeble foetus
Until you summon all your strength
And pick your succumbed self up
Cuz there's no one else who would
You perform wudhu
Like a defeated soldier,
Slouch down in a couch
Hold the Quraan and recite it through
You don't pick a chapter
You don't choose a verse
You just read from where the bookmark was
And the words that you read
Those exact words -
Not the translation, neither transliteration -
Just the way Allah has beautifully composed it in Arabic
Allah's pure words - as they flow into you
They heal you from within
Diving into the unknown, the unseen
The essence of your existence
The very soul of your being.
Ya Allah, thank you for blessing us with Al Quraan Al Kareem - the elixir of our wounded souls.