In Search of the Right Names

(on the misnaming of things)

I saw a man
untie a bird
and it flew,
straight into a storm.
The tree asked,
“Was that freedom?”
The wind replied,
“No… only escape.”

Freedom wears no wings.
It burrows
into soil that doesn’t move,
beneath rains
that do not ask why.

---

And a vine,
jealous of air,
twined itself around a tree
wounding it,
then it whispered: “Love.”
But the bark cracked.
The bees left.
The fruit never came.

Love is the scent that lingers
after the flower has decayed.
Attachment clings.
Love,
it lets go
just before it blooms.

---

And the mountain,
a volcano,
wearing snow like silence,
was not at peace.
It waited,
just as the ocean holds
a scream
only the coral knows.

They called it patience.
She was only mute,
buried
beneath unsaid
names.

---

There is a silence in gardens,
where even the wind
walks barefoot.
And there is a silence in hospitals,
where even breath
apologizes.
One is peace.
The other,
absence,
wrapped in linen.

Peace hums under its breath.
Numbness forgets
it ever had one.

---

And the sun and the spotlight
both dress a face.
But only one
warms the bone.
Some pray.
Some rehearse the prayer.
Some speak.
Some
remember their lines.

And the peacock dances,
but the stars
remain unmoved.

---

A child holds a candle
in the wind
and calls it faith.
But when the breeze grows wild,
he throws it down.
Comfort is a guest
in the house of Iman¹.

But Faith,
it sleeps
even when the walls fall.

---

Stillness
is not void.
One is the pause
the secret breath
between Ayahs².
The other,
a cave
where even shadows
forget how to return.

Stillness listens.
Emptiness forgets
what it was waiting for.

---

A single tree
in the aching throat of the desert
may cry for rain,
or recite poetry
to the moon.
One is loneliness.
The other, khalwa³.
Loneliness waits
for someone
who forgot to come.

Solitude sits
with the One
who never left.

---

And there are names
we never gave:
the salt of a tear
spilled in sujood⁴,
the colour of a lie
told gently,
the sound of a prayer
never uttered.
The world cracks,
and there are wars,
they always will be,
but the crack deepens
by misnaming the light
as shadow,
and mistaking gold
for dust.

In a cosmos built of Asma al-Husna⁵,
he who calls escape
freedom
has already
lost
his map.

1. deep inner faith and trust in God

2. a verse; a sign from God

3. sacred seclusion

4. the act of bowing face-down before God in worship; when the forehead touches earth in surrender

5. the Divine Names that shape all things