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Abdulaziz: Je Ne Me Plaindrai Pas

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Je ne me plaindrai auprès de personne, ni
n’attendrai de pardon de quiconque à part Allah,
Alors aide-moi Seigneur.

Oh Seigneur, mon cœur est infecté de confusions.

Je ne me plaindrai auprès de personne à part Toi,
même si les mers se plaignaient de sècheresse.

Même si mon corps est soumis par les chaînes,
mon esprit flotte librement dans les cieux.

Prier Allah, Qui m’a doté de patience dans les
temps d’adversité, et de gratitude pour les
moments de joie.

Prier Allah, Qui a placé un jardin et un verger en
mon sein, afin qu’ils m’accompagnent toujours.

Prier Allah, Qui m’a doté de la foi, et fait de moi un
musulman.

Prier Allah, Seigneur de l’Univers.

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Posted by on May 24, 2013 in Habsiyya, Poems by Abdulaziz

 

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Abdulaziz: I Shall Not Complain

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I shall not complain to anyone or expect
grace from anyone
other than God, so help me God.

O Lord, my heart is plagued with troubles.

I shall not complain to anyone other than You, even if the seas
complain of dryness.

My spirit is free in the heavens, while my body is overpowered
by chains.

Praise God, who has granted me patience in times of adversity
and gratitude in times of gladness.

Praise God, who placed a garden and an orchard in my bosom,
so they will be with me always.

Praise God, who has granted me faith and made me a Muslim.

Praise God, Lord of the world.

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Posted by on May 24, 2013 in Habsiyya, Poems by Abdulaziz

 

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Fulan: In the Palace of Papers

Palace of Paper

 

44:18 ?/?/?

Por Mi Amor

In the Palace of Papers a 1’000 words are written, where they go are known to none. Least of all to those who write them. Those spying, prying eyes, ignorant of the eloquence they hope to understand are in their ever blissless blunderings imprisoned, while they, themselves hope to be like that which they have “imprisoned”.

Yet words are born in the captivity of minds and are bound and confined by the limitations of text and tongues incapable of freeing them; feelings — how can such things felt, be given form in the arc and curve of confining, contrived script when they were birthed in the vastless chambers of dreams and the void of hearts hewn and honed on Haqq.

So letters are written, and letters asking for letters are written, and upon the broken backs of tongue-twisted squash are they conveyed to courts where kings are at the beck of jesters on usurped thrones, and the lyres are played, plucked by the teeth of crooked minstrels.

So inept ignorant eyes, pry and pry awaiting a day when banners are affixed and ears are gifted for that which they heard. And words scribed, while much goes unsaid and deeds are earned with a pen mightier than any sword for plundering that worth more than gold…

 
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Posted by on May 20, 2013 in Habsiyya, Poems by Fulan

 

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“I’m trying to write a poem for you.”

Shaikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al KhalifaAbdullah Al NoaimiThis is a poem I have written about my brother and friend Salman al Khalifa at the Guantanamo prison, after a long separation between us. The Americans were keen on keeping us apart. Four months later, he sent verbal greetings with the brothers, in which he said,

May peace, God’s Mercy and Blessings be upon you. I miss you a great deal and I’m trying to write a poem for you.

I felt guilty about this. Will he write a poem for me when he is no poet, while I, who claim to be a poet, have written nothing for him?” Abdullah Al Noaimi (ISN 159, Bahrain) Released November 2005; Rearrested 2008

Update:

Three years after his return from Guantánamo, al-Noaimi was working as an electrician, and was married with two children, but on October 29, 2008, as he made his way along the King Fahad Causeway, which joins Bahrain to Saudi Arabia, he was seized at a Saudi checkpoint and appears to have been detained ever since. An article in Gulf Daily News stated that it was “understood his name was included on a list of nearly 1,000 Al-Qaida suspects accused of carrying out ‘acts of war’ against Saudi Arabia,” but, as Nabeel Rajab, the president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights (BCHR), explained, al-Noaimi (described as al-Nuaimi) “had not been allowed to hire a lawyer or see any of his family,” and “had no idea of the charges against him, violating numerous articles in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”

He said, “While we fully respect and appreciate our brothers in Saudi Arabia, we do not accept any of our citizens to be arrested in this arbitrary manner, which violates the simplest international norms. Today, there are international standards and charters that should be respected as part of every country’s role in the international community.”

No explanation appears to have been provided by the Saudi authorities. 16 April, 2013 members of the Bahraini parliament protested by walking out of session and complaining that the Foreign Affairs Minister Shaikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa and the Bahraini governemnt had not done enough to demand the realease of Abdullah Al Noaimi and fellow Bahraini and former Guantanamo detainee, Abdulraheem Ali Al Murbati.

 
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Posted by on May 18, 2013 in Campaigns, Flashback

 

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Voyage du Retour

Il commence sans freins,
Se termine par une capture sans fins,
ce voyage.

Allongé dans ma cellule les yeux ouverts,
avec une joie et des sourires feints,
Je vois ma liberté consumée, mon heure venue -
Les larmes font déborder le vase de ma peine;
Ma maison est une cage aux barreaux d’acier
où le faux devient vrai, où les rêves sont brisés,
les espoirs tabassés,
où d’un nouveau statut on se voit gratifié!

L’ironie de tout ça – la détention et le reste:
Etre si petit et se tenir si haut.
Des années de larmes, des journées de labeur,
il ne reste que la peur, au bon plaisir des tyrans.
Une ordination qui expirera sûrement
sans tarder.
Mais en attendant, cette farce on doit l’endurer
seul.

Maintenant que l’on a bien appris sa leçon:
Que “la patience est une vertu”
Et que la vertu est forgée de fer,
Alors la poésie est mise en mouvement
(peut-être même sera-t-elle appréciée).

Encore et encore sur le papier j’écris,
Sachant quoi mais jamais quand -
là où les rêves commencent et les cauchemars
s’achèvent -
Je rentrerai chez moi auprès de ceux que j’aime.

-Moazzam Begg, Former Guantanamo Detainee

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Homeward Bound

Begins this journey without reins,
Ends in capture without aims;
Now lying in the cell awake,
with merriment and smiles all fake:

Freedom is spent, time is up
Tears have rent my sorrow’s cup;
Home is a cage, and cage is steel,
Thus manifest reality’s unreal.

Dreams are shattered, hopes are battered,
Yet with new status one is flattered!
The irony of it – detention and all;
Be so small, stand so tall.

Years of tears and days of toil
Are now but fears and tyrant’s spoil;
Ordainment has surely come to pass,
But endure alone one must this farce.

Now ‘patience is virtue’ taught,
And virtue is of iron wrought;
So poetry is in motion set
(perhaps, with appreciation met)

Still the papers do I pen,
Knowing what, but never when
As dreams begin, and nightmares end
I’m homeward bound to beloved tend.

-Moazzam Begg, Former Guantanamo Detainee

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Fulan: What Days Have Passed

What Days Have Passed

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Habibti…

What days have passed when pen and paper were pined for. Days when volumes were scribed upon the walls of a fractured mind. Where shadow and light were one, and fancy and phantasms roamed the halls of a maddening maze, side by side and stride by stride with fact and fading reality.

What days have passed when hands rent hearts in want and desire, pacifying pain in the dreams of what were and could be.

What days have passed when sleep and wakefulness were known only in lexicons, and the borders of dreams were dissolved in the deluge of denial and dementia.

What days have passed when hands touched and eyes found faces, if even their own.

What days are yet to come when thoughts are given leave to be born and life be lived and scattered screaming scrawlings no longer are escape from one’s self but sojourn to one’s soul…

 
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Posted by on May 13, 2013 in Habsiyya, Poems by Fulan

 

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Your Brothers in the Prisons of the UK (In What State Does this Letter Reach You?)

All praise if to Allaah Alone, Cherisher and Sustainer of the universe and Peace and Blessings be upon His Messenger, his Family, His Companions and all who follow them in righteousness until the Last Day.

{Indeed those who fear Allaah from amongst His slaves, they are the (true) scholars.}
(Al-Faatir:28)

This is an open letter from your Muslim brothers imprisoned in British prisons for the sake of their deen!

To the scholar and student of theoretical knowledge!
To the student of Islamic universities and Arabic language institutes!
To the author and translator of glossy books!
To the worshipper of the books of fiqh and Arabic lexicology!
To the orator, teacher, speaker and lecturer!
To the one whose opinion is sought and lectures are listened to!
To the one whose name lives on posters, leaflets, books and magazines!

As-Salaamu Alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu.

Praise be to Allah who said:

{Remind, for indeed the reminder is of benefit to the believers}
(Adh-Dhaariyaat: 55)

Peace and Blessings be upon His Messenger (saas) who said: “The Scholars are the inheritors of the Prophets’” May Allah be pleased with Ali bin Abi Taalib, who is reported to have said: “We do not judge the truth by the people but we judge the people by the truth.”

In what state does this letter reach you? Is your stomach full and posture comfortable? Is your garment soft and perfumed? Are your wives and children near you to bring coolness to your hearts? Do you feel at ease in the expanse of your dwelling? Is your skin supple and smooth?

We write to you from a cold, bare cell that has a toilet in one corner. We write to you seated upon wooden chairs and hard beds. We write to you with hungry stomachs awaiting our next meal at the wings of our captors. We write to you clothed in coarse prison garments with unperfumed bodies and rough, chapped skin. We write to you whilst we are far estranged from our families, children and loved ones. We write to you from behind bars.

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Posted by on May 11, 2013 in Risala, Letters from Fulan

 

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Est-il vrai?

 

Est-il vrai? Que l’herbe repousse après la pluie?
Est-il vrai? Que les fleurs s’épanouiront au
printemps?
Est-il vrai? Que les oiseaux migreront à nouveau
vers leur nid?
Est-il vrai? Que le saumon nage en remontant le
courant?

Cela est vrai. C’est vrai. Et ce sont des miracles.
Mais est-il vrai qu’un jour nous quitteront
Guantanamo Bay?
Est-il vrai qu’un beau jour nous rentrerons chez
nous?
Je vogue dans mes rêves et je rêve, de revenir chez
moi.

D’être avec mes enfants, chacun une part de moi;
D’être avec ma femme, et avec tous ceux que
j’aime;
D’être avec mes parents, coeurs les plus tendres en
ce monde.
Je rêve d’être là, libre et loin de cette cage.

Mais m’entends-tu, oh Juge, m’entends tu?
Nous sommes tous ici même innocents, n’avons
commis aucun crime.
Libère -moi, libère-nous tous, s’il reste encore un
peu de
Justice, s’il reste un peu de compassion en ce
monde!

Osama Hassan Abu Kabir, détenu de Guantanamo

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Posted by on May 7, 2013 in Habsiyya, Poems by Osama Abu Kabir

 

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Talha Ahsan: Sonnet of Grime for Right Honourable Theresa May

Theresa May

Silver bouffant, saucy smile, kitten heels,
terrorists dare not even speak your name.
Your predecessors made some dodgy deals;
some people are so blind they lack the shame.

A Euro-judgement clears the USA,
So party in a pair of Jimmy Choos
and shake it down my darling bud of May -
what else will show you are my greatest muse?

The love that dare not speak its name is true.
My lonely candle burning in despair,
I flicker with these dreams I wish you knew -
don’t snuff them out, just smother me with care.

Theresa May, my babe, my crazy chick,
all I ask: drop this extraditing shtick.

-Talha Ahsan, HMP Long Lartin
May  2012

 
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Posted by on December 25, 2012 in Habsiyya, Poems by Talha Ahsan

 

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