Miscellenous Thoughts

I live a life of linguistic detours and miscellaneous thoughts merely moving from one nostalgic moment to the next.

[thelitgeek]

Profound 💭

[thelitgeek]

My grandmother will always tell me not to straighten my hair, she said it was too beautiful to be burnt by a flat iron, she always told me that my dark  skin was too sacred for cheap make up. She reminded me to eat to my fill because the western standards of beauty would never really apply to me i was an exception. According to her the first day that my eyes should see a mascarra and the tip of an eye liner should be when im getting groomed for my wedding. My grandmother said people should never really see you at your best unless they  deserve to.

My grandmother was wise and right… 

[thelitgeek]

“Modern English is the Wal-Mart of languages: convenient, huge, hard to avoid, superficially friendly, and devouring all rivals in its eagerness to expand.”

— Mark Abley (via languageloveaffair)

[thelitgeek]

Allah is Subtle with His servants; He gives provisions to whom He wills. And He is the Powerful, the Exalted in Might.

Qur'an 42:19

[thelitgeek]

Lately i am learning to be alone, i am learning to listen to the silence in the night before i fall asleep. I am learning to face all the discomfort that accompanies ones thoughts. I am learning how to talk about it to myself, how to write about it, how to theorise it and find it in others. I'm learning to be kinder to myself and to be kinder to others. I am learning to love my own company and cherish the silence. I look forward to it, wake up extra early to greet myself, fall asleep effortlessly, walk home from work, stare at a random tree, look at the stars and find the moon. I am learning lately that you must learn how to be alone so that you can be better with others.

[thelitgeek]

Patience and Love agreed to meet at a set time and place; beneath the twenty-third tree in the olive orchard. Patience arrived promptly and waited. She checked her watch every so often but still, there was no sign of Love. Was it the twenty-third tree or the fifty-sixth? She wondered and decided to check, just in case. As she made her way over to the fifty-sixth tree, Love arrived at twenty-three, where Patience was noticeably absent. Love waited and waited before deciding he must have the wrong tree and perhaps it was another where they were supposed to meet. Meanwhile, Patience had arrived at the fifty-sixth tree, where Love was still nowhere to be seen. Both begin to drift aimlessly around the olive orchard, almost meeting but never do. Finally, Patience, who was feeling lost and resigned, found herself beneath the same tree where she began. She stood there for barely a minute when there was a tap on her shoulder. It was love...

“Where are you?” She asked. “I have been searching all my life.” “Stop looking for me,” Love replied, “and I will find you.

Lang Leav, Lullabies

[thelitgeek]

I miss her all the time lately the way she used to call my name so beautifully as though the syllables felt like home between her lips. Her laughter always had a way of making me feel like home. I don't think i know myself as the world seems so empty without my future being embellished by her presence. How can sadness be this heavy and feel this empty at the same time?

[wordsnquotes]

I think the act of reading imbues the reader with a sensitivity toward the outside world that people who don’t read can sometimes lack. I know it seems like a contradiction in terms; after all reading is such a solitary, internalizing act that it appears to represent a disengagement from day-to-day life. But reading, and particularly the reading of fiction, encourages us to view the world in new and challenging ways…It allows us to inhabit the consciousness of another which is a precursor to empathy, and empathy is, for me, one of the marks of a decent human being.

John Connolly, The Book of Lost Things (via wordsnquotes)

[thelitgeek]

Do not let someone who likes sugar tell you that their pallete cannot handle all the spice in you darling you will find someone one day whose throat will burn in your presence who will sweat tons when you smile but will still continue to take glances in your direction. You are awesome don’t let someone bland tell you otherwise.

The perfect blend (via thelitgeek)

[thelitgeek]

My grandmother will always tell me not to straighten my hair, she said it was too beautiful to be burnt by a flat iron, she always told me that my dark  skin was too sacred for cheap make up. She reminded me to eat to my fill because the western standards of beauty would never really apply to me i was an exception. According to her the first day that my eyes should see a mascarra and the tip of an eye liner should be when im getting groomed for my wedding. My grandmother said people should never really see you at your best unless they  deserve to.

My grandmother was wise and right… 

[thelitgeek]

At 15 I read about the skin head vulture About the most sacred things Like love or laughter existing in the ruins You were right There has never been black and white Or even grey At 15 I read about a man who loved his daughter more than he loved lines So he blurred them everyday We were young With butterflies underneath our feet We bumped auras You called me a hurricane I had stirred your cool so much You fell for me I caught you right before you hit the ground since then I was good You always said so yourself Only good Definitions after definitions I always wanted to be more Sweet and spicy Sour even sometimes So I curved stains in to your perspective I stirred so hard That you were carried away in to oblivion At 15 I read about mid points I still haven’t found my own I was never a mathematician And my points have always been missed Navigating my way through crossroads That I had created I learnt one thing that definitions aren’t restricting Or liberating They are just definitions

Good, N.A (via thelitgeek)

[thelitgeek]

The thing about grief is that you think you have forgotten and everything is better now until it swells up your chest and restricts your heart from pumping blood to your head, your limbs your lungs. Until you forget how to breath in and your eyes are foggy with tears in the middle of a bus during your morning commute to work and you realise that you will never hear her voice again the way she called you to come massage her feet. You will never smell the fragrance of home in her clothes you will never get to feel her in your arms. The thing about grief is you think you are okay until your not.

[meanwhilepoetry]

I am still learning how hope is sometimes a dark thing disguised as a bluebird and how some bluebirds never come back home.

Nikita Gill, Fragment #4 (via meanwhilepoetry)

[wnq-writers]

Have you ever been in the situation where you’ve been hiding the fact that you’re sad from everyone for a really long time and you’re out in public one day and a complete stranger asks if you’re okay? It’s kind of sad in a way because secretly you’ve wanted someone to notice you’re unhappy for a really long time… but when a complete stranger asks, you realize just how clearly it’s written on your face and you wonder why the people closest to you never seem to see it.

Ranata Suzuki (via wnq-writers)

[thelitgeek]

Women carry the weight of a man's insecurities on their shoulders. If you look carefully behind the childlike innocence and the performed incompetence there is a mother, one that looks for the inner child in a man's destructions, the sadness and soreness in his sulks. She builds forts around his insecurities and bares the weight of his masks. You are not his mother; you do not have to dumb yourself down or pretend you are not beautiful, you do not have to be a sponge or even act like you do not reach stuff on top of counters. He is not a boy, he is not your boy. You do not have to raise him or praise him or even carry him when he cannot carry himself. You do not have to be embarrassed on his behalf and angrily scold him when he stumbles around your emotions. He is a man, his creator made him so with no strings attached. No strings attached.

[thelitgeek]

A friend told me last night that when we perform the act of self care through constructive criticism we are true adults and he explained by saying a child needs a mother to constantly remind them to do better, work harder and stay out of trouble. A true adult simply does this all on their own. The transition between childhood and adulthood simply involves us learning to care for our ownselves before we have to care for others.

Deep midnight conversations about self care and growth

[thelitgeek]

At the end of the day of eid ul Ad'ha I get quite nostalgic for the year that has departed and quite hopeful for the year that awaits. Alhamdulilah it has been a year of growth and laughter and it's months were filled with so much excitement and newness so much love and joy. Though we have had our fair share of tears and trials in summary Allah has blessed us immensely. So with that being said Eid Mubarak to you and your family may Allah make us amongst those whose sins have been forgiven and status raised in front of Ar-Rahman.