Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Accept Me As I Am [a prayer for the profane]

Accept me as I am.

A liar, a fool, a pretender.
A profane obnoxiousness full of venom
and lies.
A soul refracted into many --
all reflections mere imposters --
pining for one.

Accept this.

See me
who I am.
See me.
See the filth, the lie, the shining heart
that yearns and yearns and yearns
even in its maddening forgetfulness.

This mad woman
with a tattered robe
and a mouth full of lies --
lies and venom.
Lies and venom.

Accept me as I am.

For I am a serpent,
I am a lie,
I am a masterful delusion
that children can see through for a laugh.
A cauldron bubbling, toads croaking in the silence
while some angels double over in laughter at the drama that this is.

Yes, it's a drama.
It's an expulsion.
It's a spitting of words jumbled, uncouth, unrelated that do not belong to my mouth.

I have drank venom
and I spit it,
I spit it,
I spit it.
Such a cad of a woman.

I am in tatters
but proud.
I am mad
but vain.
I have no reason,
no notion,
no not even bewilderment.

Just a load of hateful lies to spit out. Out and out.

I spit.
I spit out that I am other than who I am.
I am me.
I spit out that I must not will to live.
I live.
I spit out that another but You is the master of my faith.
I say, "No!"

I say no, no, no, no!
None of you fake imposters,
you oblivious beings
who do not find meaning within your wondrous existence, you!
You!
You whose eyes are glued inwards,
looking into the back of their abysmal skulls,
watching your endless plays of misery or trivial happiness
are my masters.
You are liars.
You are liars.
You do not even know your fate.
You do not know what raced you to conception,
and what is guiding you swiftly towards your death
you self-serving dolls!

You are not my masters.

Alas! Alas! Master! They have held my soul by the throat.
They have held my soul by the throat and poured in me their vials of lies
suggesting that You are forgetful, that You do not love,
that we are not together, You & I,
living and breathing one another in one breath of
Al-
Lah.
Al-
Lah!

Breathe me.
Breathe me my Master.
I have become profane.
And You are Sacred.
I am a lie.
And You are the Truth.
I am a delusion, a whiff of dust.
And I take three spaces when I have but one for me.
Therefore You Are! You Are! You Are!
You Are.

Lead me.


~
.ramla
12:48 am
Sitting in the lawn
legs folded
on the grass
under the moonlight, and the warming rays of a street-lamp
Karachi, Pakistan