Khan Quotes

Friends are the family you choose (~ Nin/Ithilnin, Elven rogue).

Walk on with hope in your heart, and you'll never walk alone

your hand touching mine. this is how galaxies collide.

the saddest thing is to be a minute to someone, when you've made them your eternity.

in a world full of temporary things you are a perpetual feeling.

I am the punishment of God...If you had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon you.

The splendid thing about falling apart silently... is that you can start over as many times as you like.

i want to be in love with you the same way i am in love with the moon with the light shining out of its soul.

a flower knows, when its butterfly will return, and if the moon walks out, the sky will understand; but now it hurts, to watch you leave so soon, when I don't know, if you will ever come back.

To fall in love with someone's thoughts - the most intimate, splendid romance.

If you're afraid - don't do it, - if you're doing it - don't be afraid!

Sometimes I think, I need a spare heart to feel all the things I feel.

All shadows of clouds the sun cannot hide like the moon cannot stop oceanic tide; but a hidden star can still be smiling at night's black spell on darkness, beguiling

my mother is pure radiance. she is the sun i can touch and kiss and hold without getting burnt.

an action comitted in anger is an action doomed to failure.

even in the loneliest moments i have been there for myself.

lean in to kiss me in all the places where the ache is the most special.

May your love for me be like the scent of the evening sea drifting in through a quiet window so i do not have to run or chase or fall ... to feel you all i have to do is breathe.

There can be no rebirth without a dark night of the soul, a total annihilation of all that you believed in and thought that you were.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea.

Ocean separates lands, not souls..

in the afterglow of an evening rain i lay down in the grass and think of you my body aches like an after-kiss breaking in soft fires and wildflowers my dear, i will always be this tender for you.

In spite of the seven thousand books of expert advice, the right way to disciplne a child is still a mystery to most fathers and...mothers Only your grandmother and Genghis Khan know how to do it.

Not words. nor laughter. but rather someone who will fall in love with your silence.

I had embraced you... long before i hugged you.

Rahim Khan laughed. “Children aren’t coloring books. You don’t get to fill them with your favorite colors.

Careful with the accusations of insanity, oh my lady whose home is a tower with windows of brick, all for the sake of some skinny-ankled, laugh-prone boy of a khan.

she's got oceans tucked away in her hair poems swim under her skin.

tell me of something fiercer than the love with which i gaze upon you of something softer than the tenderness with which i hold you.

If someone corrects you, and you feel offended, then you have an ego problem.

i have laughed more than daffodils and cried more than June.

...so i will greet you in a way all loved things are meant to be greeted with a tear in my heart and a poem in my eye.

how is it that he's always in my thoughts. even when i am not thinking.

Tea is just an excuse. i am drinking this sunset, this evening. and you.

it was the kind of moon that I would want to send back to my ancestors and gift to my descendants so they know that I too, have been bruised...by beauty.

I am the flail of god. Had you not created great sins, god would not have sent a punishment like me upon you.

There is still one of which you never speak.' Marco Polo bowed his head. 'Venice,' the Khan said. Marco smiled. 'What else do you believe I have been talking to you about?' The emperor did not turn a hair. 'And yet I have never heard you mention that name.' And Polo said: 'Every time I describe a city I am saying something about Venice.

because some things sometimes aren't ours to hold, but just beautiful to listen to.

whatever you do be gentle with yourself. you don’t just live in this world or your home or your skin. you also live in someone’s eyes.

There is something mystically sad and beautiful about how i will never see you again but meet you again and again in poetry.

funny how our hearts were designed to love so fiercely. but break ever so gently.

There is no value in anything until it is finished.

God breaks the heart again and again and again until it stays open.

Some people look for a beautiful place, others make a place beautiful.

We grown-up people think that we appreciate music, but if we realized the sense that an infant has brought with it of appreciating sound and rhythm, we would never boast of knowing music. The infant is music itself.

the intensity in your eyes burns my pen as i write.

When it comes to love do not ever settle for anything less than magical.

One is never so strong as when one is broken.

Once in a while i am struck all over again... by just how blue the sky appears .. on wind-played autumn mornings, blue enough to bruise a heart.

my dear, we are all made of water. it's okay to rage. sometimes it's okay to rest. to recede.

Fall in love with the energy of the mornings trace your fingers along the lull of the afternoons take the spirit of the evenings in your arms kiss it deeply and then make love to the tranquility of the nights.

this life has been a landscape of pain and still, flowers bloom in it.

i write because it is the only way i can reach you.

I came ready to fight Genghis Khan and I walk in on a shut-in playing the biggest Dungeons and Dragons game in history.

sometimes i don't know, which moment which cool gust of wind will come, and enchant me tousling my hair and my heart, stirring...that familiar ache of poetry, which drop will kiss the old wrench in my soul reminding me, all over again i miss you better in the rain.

i'm glad to be alive in a world where his gently awakening eyes nourish the morning sun.

my dear, I have nothing to say. my heart burns like the evening sky.

some winters will never melt some summers will never freeze and some things will only ... live in poems.

K is for "Kenghis Khan"; He was a very nice person. History has no record of him. There is a moral in that, somewhere.

What's a rainy day without some delicious coffee-flavoured loneliness?

With callused hands i tasted the softness of the moon in the coldest winds i discovered my soul's warmest fireplace in the roughness of his stubble the tenderest love.

moonlight disappears down the hills mountains vanish into fog and i vanish into poetry.

...and so many colors I will have seen... the menacing greys and pine greens the soft pink and purples of spring and summer blue and so many others without you.

my love for you will always be like a mountain stream. quiet. persistent. continuous.

depth and substance. the two most exquisite qualities. be it in a poem or a person.

Conquering the world on horseback is easy; it is dismounting and governing that is hard.

for we all have our own twilights and mists and abysses to return to.

your smile. is the ultimate golden dream. all the poems in the world are waking up from.

It is not defeat that destroys you,it is being demoralized by defeat that destroy you.

love wounds me with soft pillows with tender lips and fingers

If you can't swallow your pride, you can't lead. Even the highest mountain had animals that step on it.

I find it incredibly amazing how at every sunset, the sky is a different shade. No cloud is ever in the same place. Each day is a new masterpiece. A new wonder. A new memory.

Whatever you get out of poetry - take it. take it. take it. Words are better off felt than understood.

the one who will jolt awake all the unwritten the unsung and the unlived in me. i am waiting for him.

The greatest happiness is to vanquish your enemies, to chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth, to see those dear to them bathed in tears, to clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters.

Do not turn me into restless waters if you cannot promise to be my stream.

The first key to leadership is self-control.

The great man, Genghis Khan, only knew how to shoot eagles with an arrow. The past is past. To see real heroes, look around you.

Who can’t stop drinking may get drunken three times a month. If he does it more often, he is guilty. To get drunken twice a month is better; once, still more praiseworthy. But not to drink at all - what could be better than this? But where could such a being be found? But if one would find it, it would be worthy of all honour.

i hope that whoever you are wherever you are and no matter how you are feeling you will always have something to smile about.

For it is up to you and me to take solace in nostalgia's arms and our ability to create the everlasting from fleeting moments.

One clear moment, one of trance One missed step, one perfect dance One missed shot, one and only chance Life is all...but one fleeting glance.

When we pay attention to nature's music, we find that everything on the Earth contributes to its harmony.

There are always possibilities.

The magic fades too fast the scent of summer never lasts the nights turn hollow and vast but nothing remains...nothing lasts.

stronger than mountains. a place where my heart feels the safest- underneath his shirt.

For you i have saved poems under my skin.

People are not rain or snow or autumn leaves; they do not look beautiful when they fall.

I`d rather sink trying to be different, than stay afloat like everyone else

Moth: I gave you my life. Flame: I allowed you to kiss me.

When admiring other people's gardens, don't forget to tend to your own flowers.

The words that enlighten the soul are more precious than jewels.

The first lesson to learn is to resign oneself to the little difficulties in life, not to hit out at everything one comes up against. If one were able to manage this one would not need to cultivate great power; even one's presence would be healing.

Words are powerful forces of nature. they are destruction. they are nourishment. they are flesh. they are water. they are flowers and bone. they burn. they cleanse they erase. they etch. they can either leave you feeling homeless or brimming with home.

You are that one breath. that puts all the remaining breaths. back into my body.

There is a moon, that rests in the quiet corners of a lover’s lips.

There are two aspects of individual harmony: the harmony between body and soul, and the harmony between individuals. All the tragedy in the world, in the individual and in the multitude, comes from lack of harmony. And harmony is the best given by producing harmony in one's own life.

Very often in everyday life one sees that by losing one's temper with someone who has already lost his, one does not gain anything but only sets out upon the path of stupidity. He who has enough self-control to stand firm at the moment when the other person is in a temper, wins in the end. It is not he who has spoken a hundred words aloud who has won; it is he who has perhaps spoken only one word.

I want to read every book that’s written hear every song that was sung I want to gaze at every cloud and hold the zing of each fruit on my tongue.

The real dawah to Islam is the character of a Muslim.

A man's greatest joy is crushing his enemies.

The human spirit lives on creativity and dies in conformity and routine.

leave me a smile just warm enough... to spend a million golden afternoons in.

may my faith always be at the end of the day like a hummingbird...returning to its favorite flower.

i would rather have feelings without words than words without feelings.

The more you study, the more you know; how less you know.

Yaad-e-Mazi Aazab Hai Ya Rab... Cheen Lay Mujh Say Hafiza Mera.........!!!

Wild animals are less wild and more human than many humans of this world

Marco Polo describes a bridge, stone by stone. 'But which is the stone that supports the bridge?' Kublai Khan asks. 'The bridge is not supported by one stone or another,' Marco answers, 'but by the line of the arch that they form.' Kublai Khan remains silent, reflecting. Then he adds: 'Why do you speak to me of the stones? It is only the arch that matters to me.' Polo answers: 'Without stones there is no arch.

If I began to draw myself away from you we’d still be like two mixed colors of paint impossible to separate.

Give me a moon-blanket night to keep me warm a long-gone smile to comfort me a pair of rain-blue eyes to haunt me a simple soul ...to love me.

there are some poems that we leave behind some that leave us behind while some just live silently in the heart crumble, sometimes dwindle disappear die and are reborn when you smile again.

be the kiss in my hair that no one sees move, when i move sigh, when i sigh... be that line from a poem that i hold in my eyes.

You don’t need to be the tide to rise and fall, you don’t have to be a wave to touch the shore; just be a little sand-grain and feel them all

Love is like dried flowers sometimes. Even though you watch the petals shrink and change colour, you cannot help treasuring them

the most beautiful tide is the sweep of your heart against mine.

Divine sound is the cause of all manifestation. The knower of the mystery of sound knows the mystery of the whole universe.

If people but knew their own religion, how tolerant they would become, and how free from any grudge against the religion of others.

a silent night. - the most eloquent poem i have ever read.

Don't be concerned about being disloyal to your pain by being joyous.

Reason is the illusion of reality

What you desire is what you want, what you have is what Allah wants.

Everything in life is speaking in spite of its apparent silence.

By our trust in the divine beauty in every person we develop that beauty in ourselves.

I had never seen the jungle. They fed me behind bars from an iron pan till one night I felt that I was Bagheera - the Panther - and no man's plaything, and I broke the silly lock with one blow of my paw and came away; and because I had learned the ways of men, I became more terrible in the jungle than Shere Khan.

I breathe in... the fragrance of love, and moist sand the one his roses left on both my hands I just keep on breathing every moment as much as I can preserving it, in my body for the day it can’t.

Soft feathers cannot make a cruel bird kind

I wish to stay drenched forever in those rain-blue eyes in those...soul-reaching crystals not moving a muscle nor breathing just savoring this turquoise ache against my heart.

I write because there are things in me that cannot die.

Maybe life is all about twirling under one of those midnight skies, cutting a swathe through the breeze and gently closing your eyes.

May you always have open breezy spaces in your mind.

I wish to spend a lifetime near a lighthouse where loneliness will be the glimmer of luminous prancing upon ocean waves… rising and falling only for my breathing.

I have always believed that one should not be scared of losing,I think that really is the key.

The first key to leadership was self-control, particularly the mastery of pride, which was something more difficult, he explained, to subdue than a wild lion and anger, which was more difficult to defeat than the greatest wrestler. He warned them that "if you can't swallow your pride, you can't lead.

The solution to the problem of the day is the awakening of the consciousness of humanity to the divinity within.

i am either a storm or a drought. in-betweens have never been my thing.

I do not want to sleep for fear I might miss the twinkle of the brightest star for fear I may never know how the moon glimmers, in the darkest hour.

A mind can bleed a heart to death.

and the afterglow... of your gaze...is the only sweater that I need.

Do not feel sad for your tears as rocks never regret the waterfalls

If doctors are paid the same salary as bus drivers, community would not be crazy about making their children doctors

you are ever the only one i want to give all the peaches in my heart to the only one by whom i want them bruised.

there is some aching that will only heal... in the mosque of sleep.

sharab peene de masjid mein beth kar, Yaa woh jagha bata jahan Khuda nahin..

Every cup that passes through a single person and eventually rejoins the world’s water supply holds enough molecules to mix 1,500 of them into every other cup of water in the world. No way around it: some of the water you just drank passed through the kidneys of Socrates, Genghis Khan, and Joan of Arc. How about air? Also vital. A single breathful draws in more air molecules than there are breathfuls of air in Earth’s entire atmosphere. That means some of the air you just breathed passed through the lungs of Napoleon, Beethoven, Lincoln, and Billy the Kid.

Wrap your mind around my thoughts as I wrap my soul around your heart.

Love me...with all the abandon of a sudden wild rain.

your gaze across my cheeks turned them into strawberry fields.

I blink January’s lashes and gush down December’s cheeks

i will forever be colliding with a billion unnamed undiscovered stars, each of us on our own orbital paths.

Furthermore, unlike many other great predators of history, from Genghis Khan to the Spanish conquistadors, King Leopold II never saw a drop of blood spilled in anger. He never set foot in the Congo. There is something very modern about that, too, as there is about the bomber pilot in the stratosphere, above the clouds, who never hears screams or sees shattered homes or torn flesh.

sometimes i wake up in the middle of the night and find poetry splattered all over my bed.

Without the vision of a goal, a man cannot manage his own life, much less the lives of others.

I have loved in life and I have been loved. I have drunk the bowl of poison from the hands of love as nectar, and have been raised above life's joy and sorrow. My heart, aflame in love, set afire every heart that came in touch with it. My heart has been rent and joined again; My heart has been broken and again made whole; My heart has been wounded and healed again; A thousand deaths my heart has died, and thanks be to love, it lives yet. I went through hell and saw there love's raging fire, and I entered heaven illumined with the light of love. I wept in love and made all weep with me; I mourned in love and pierced the hearts of men; And when my fiery glance fell on the rocks, the rocks burst forth as volcanoes. The whole world sank in the flood caused by my one tear; With my deep sigh the earth trembled, and when I cried aloud the name of my beloved, I shook the throne of God in heaven. I bowed my head low in humility, and on my knees I begged of love, "Disclose to me, I pray thee, O love, thy secret." She took me gently by my arms and lifted me above the earth, and spoke softly in my ear, "My dear one, thou thyself art love, art lover, and thyself art the beloved whom thou hast adored.

It's been a year and 3 months since we've kissed, and I rather have the ghost of his mouth on my lips than kiss anyone else.

And stay, my dear stay... forever, as my quiet song, in my lilac dawn.

let me die from having being drunk on indigo skies, my liver... overflowing with stars.

Stars are always dancing. Sometimes they dance twinkling away with the rhythm of your joyful heart and sometimes they dance without movement to embrace your heartache as if frozen sculptures of open-armed sadness.

Drink in the moon as though you might die of thirst.

you make autumn mist taste like champagne and turn winter rain into the elixir of life itself.

Some pain has no relief,it can only be sealed You can grasp the wound to feel the scar unhealed.

in the end it is words poetry. sunsets someone’s deep blue silk voice. mountain scents. someone’s smile. eyes. that we have no defenses against.

i have known you since the beginning of time the one i have loved always in spirit. only just discovered in person.

i want to stay curled and cosied and chocolated....forever in my mother’s arms.

you were and always will be that first ever touch to have fertilized the ground beneath my life’s trees that first ever rose to have fragranced the rest of my memories.

Some of the toughest ayaat in the Quran have Allah's name "ar-Rahman" in them to make it clear that just because Allah is the Most Merciful, it doesn't mean He's not going to carry out justice.

A moment’s beginning ends in a moment

A leader should demonstrate his thoughts and opinions through his actions, not through his words.

Tell me..how do you stand there? filling the doorway....of my life.

words like mysterious mermaids come and live permanently in the soft sweeps and scars of my skin.

Love, be mystical as the flickering blue flame of night as the fully-awoken moon beneath cobwebs of passing clouds amidst chanting high-tides fuzzy, as my blanket big enough to illuminate a hundred thousand billion galaxies and just small enough to fit into my embrace.

If my life were a fragrance, it would smell like the sea.

for all I can really do is stand here in September’s rain savoring… soaking it all in slipping.. and simply holding on to poetry for dear life.

Poems can get sleepless too and become the loneliest thing in the universe.

All that produces longing in the heart deprives the heart of freedom.

It's happened many times before. Usually it results in an exceptional and gifted human. Some of the greatest figures in Earth's history were actually the product of humans and the Loric, including Buddha, Aristotle, Julius Ceasar, Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein... Aprodite, Apollo, Hermes, and Zeus were all real, and had one Loric parent

I am filled time and again with a heart-aching wonder when I think of the fire and frost of memories of the everlastingness of love the solace of family and the power of prayer.

We will go out into the world and plant gardens and orchards to the horizons, we will build roads through the mountains and across the deserts, and terrace the mountains and irrigate the deserts until there will be garden everywhere, and plenty for all, and there will be no more empires or kingdoms, no more caliphs, sultans, emirs, khans, or zamindars, no more kings or queens or princes, no more quadis or mullahs or ulema, no more slavery and no more usury, no more property and no more taxes, no more rich and no more poor, no killing or maiming or torture or execution, no more jailers and no more prisoners, no more generals, soldiers, armies or navies, no more patriarchy, no more caste, no more hunger, no more suffering than what life brings us for being born and having to die, and then we will see for the first time what kind of creatures we really are.

Hands. Cheeks. Eyes. Lips. Neck. Ears. Thighs. Heart. Soul. Ahh! the things I get to savor you with.

Instead of lamenting your fate, create your world.

In this world, unity is achievable only by learning to unite in spite of differences, rather than insisting on unity without differences. For their total eradication is an impossibility. The secret of attaining peace in life is tolerance of disturbance of the peace. (p. 99)

i immerse myself in you like i immerse myself into a beautiful story.

As the sky prepares to settle its tired, aching feet into the night’s velvet slippers I settle, into my armchair, soaking the teabag, of my thoughts, into warm liquidy stars.

this heart yearns... for the salt of unsmelt air unswept thunderstorms... unknown adventures.

The word 'jihad' has nowhere been used in the Qur'an to mean war in the sense of launching an offensive. It is used rather to mean 'struggle'. the action most consistently called for in the Qur'an is the exercise of patience. (p. 7-8)

If you are well-mannered towards those whose views are similar to yours, you may be said to exhibit a fairly good character. But, if you behave properly wit those holding divergent views from you or who criticize you, then you deserve to be credited with having an excellent character. (p. 99)

I am a tale, I am a book, written in different languages and styles I can’t be read, can’t be understood, neither by me nor the greatest of minds I am too big, I am too small, to be processed or seen by the naked eye I am too dim, I am too bright, to appear in the shadows or the sunshine.

When you help people, don't wait around to hear them say, "Thank you." A lot of times we do good things, but in the back of our mind we're hoping to get some appreciation. But if you make your intentions pure, and you expect only from Allah, He will take more care of you than you could ever imagine.

Ancient moon priestesses were called virgins. ‘Virgin’ meant not married, not belong to a man - a woman who was ‘one-in-herself’. The very word derives from a Latin root meaning strength, force, skill; and was later applied to men: virle. Ishtar, Diana, Astarte, Isis were all all called virgin, which did not refer to sexual chasity, but sexual independence. And all great culture heroes of the past…, mythic or historic, were said to be born of virgin mothers: Marduk, Gilgamesh, Buddha, Osiris, Dionysus, Genghis Khan, Jesus - they were all affirmed as sons of the Great Mother, of the Original One, their worldly power deriving from her. When the Hebrews used the word, and in the original Aramaic, it meant ‘maiden’ or ‘young woman’, with no connotations to sexual chasity. But later Christian translators could not conceive of the ‘Virgin Mary’ as a woman of independent sexuality, needless to say; they distorted the meaning into sexually pure, chaste, never touched. When Joan of Arc, with her witch coven associations, was called La Pucelle - ‘the Maiden,’ ‘the Virgin’ - the word retained some of its original pagan sense of a strong and independent woman. The Moon Goddess was worshipped in orgiastic rites, being the divinity of matriarchal women free to take as many lovers as they choose. Women could ‘surrender’ themselves to the Goddess by making love to a stranger in her temple.

It is when things are at their worst that Allah will raise the best generation. The generation that the Prophet would be told Sahabat should look up to. So maybe the fact that you are living in the darkest of time means that Allah thinks you can be the strongest source of light. Allah thinks you -- you -- were born for this time. That's Allah's decision. Which means you have something significant to offer the world. You have some serious trees to plant. And you have to not get overwhelmed with the news around you. Even if dajjal is tapping you on the shoulders. Say (to Dajjal), "Hold on, I'm planting a tree". You do what you gotta do. You gotta focus.

The water you kids were playing in, he said, had probably been to Africa and the North Pole. Genghis Khan or Saint Peter or even Jesus may have drunk it. Cleopatra might have bathed in it. Crazy Horse might have watered his pony with it. Sometimes water was liquid. Sometimes it was rock hard- ice. Sometimes it was soft- snow. Sometimes it was visible but weightless- clouds. And sometimes it was completely invisible- vapor- floating up into the the sky like the soals of dead people. There was nothing like water in the world, Jim said. It made the desert bloom but also turned rich bottomland into swamp. Without it we'd die, but it could also kill us, and that was why we loved it, even craved it, but also feared it. Never take water forgranted, Jim said. Always cherish it. Always beware of it.

Every atom you possess has almost certainly passed through several stars and been part of millions of organisms on its way to becoming you. We are each so atomically numerous and so vigorously recycled at death that a significant number of our atoms - up to a billion for each of us, it has been suggested - probably once belonged to Shakespeare. A billion more each came from Buddha and Genghis Khan and Beethoven, and any other historical figure you care to name. So we are all reincarnations - though short-lived ones. When we die, our atoms will disassemble and move off to find new uses elsewhere - as part of a leaf or other human being or drop of dew.

‎"Intellect is the knowledge obtained by experience of names and forms; wisdom is the knowledge which manifests only from the inner being; to acquire intellect one must delve into studies, but to obtain wisdom, nothing but the flow of divine mercy is needed; it is as natural as the instinct of swimming to the fish, or of flying to the bird. Intellect is the sight which enables one to see through the external world, but the light of wisdom enables one to see through the external into the internal world.

There are certain verses in the Quran which convey injunctions similar to the following: 'Kill them wherever you find them.' (2:191) Referring to such verses, there are some who attempt to give the impression that Islam is a religion of war and violence. This is total untrue. Such verses relate in a restricted sense, to those who have unilaterally attacked the Muslims. The above verse does not convey the general command of Islam. (pp. 42-43)

I keep my kindness in my eyes Gently folded around my iris Like a velvety, brown blanket That warms my vision I keep my shyness in my hair Tucked away into a ponytail Looking for a chance to escape On a few loose strands in the air I keep my anger on my lips Just waiting to unleash into the world But trust me; it’s never in my heart It evaporates into words I keep my dignity upon my chin Like a torch held up high For those who have betrayed me Radiating a silent, strong message I keep my gratitude in my smile A glistening waterfall in the sun Gently splashing at that person Who made me happy for some reason I keep my sensitivity in my hands Reaching out for your wet cheek Holding you, with all the love The love I want to share, and feel I keep my passion in my writing My words breathing like fire Screeching against an endless road As I continue to be inspired I keep my simplicity in my soul Spread over me like a clear sky Reflecting all that I am And all that’s ever passed me by And I hope you will look Beyond my ordinary face My simple, tied hair My ordinary tastes And I hope you will see me From everyone...apart As I keep my beauty in my heart.

I have some advice for the young generation who are wanting to become successful in life: become more grateful. Once you do that, Allah says, "If you are grateful, I will surely increase you (in everything)." If you're having a hard time in math, science, language and whatever else, become grateful to Allah and He will open doors for you. You'll even get better at basketball and become more athletic. I pray that Allah makes you grateful young people who are examples for others all over the world, ameen.

As long as I can hear the sweet melody of your words, I need not; The angel’s secret, to be whispered in my ears As long as I can lace your silky fingers round my own, I need not; Pretty diamonds, nor big cash nor gold As long as I can watch the handsome sunshine of your face, I need not; Open skies, nor snowfall, nor the rain As long as I can gaze into the emeralds of your eyes, I need not; New colors, new wings or paradise As long as I can feel the tender tickle of your breath, I need not; The drifting wind, nor its call, nor caress As long as I can feel your soft lips upon mine, I need not; Melted sugar, nor the most expensive of wines As long as I can feel your warm body close to me I need not; A blanket, nor a bonfire's luxury As long as I can see you every morning I wake, I need not; A mirror, nor a cloud, nor shade As long as I can keep you in every petal of memories I need not: Dreams, nor desires, nor fantasies And as long as I can hold you in every moment that I breathe, I need not; Oxygen, nor blood, nor heartbeats.

I first believed without any hesitation in the existence of the soul, and then I wondered about the secret of its nature. I persevered and strove in search of the soul, and found at last that I myself was the cover over my own soul. I realized that that in me which believed and that in me that wondered, that which was found at last, was no other than my soul. I thanked the darkness that brought me to the light, and I valued this veil that prepared for me the vision in which I saw myself reflected, the vision produced in the mirror of my soul. Since then, I have seen all souls as my soul, and realized my soul as the soul of all. And what bewilderment it was when I realized that I alone was, if there were anyone, that I am whatever and whoever exists, and that I shall be whoever there will be in the future.

1. Bangladesh.... In 1971 ... Kissinger overrode all advice in order to support the Pakistani generals in both their civilian massacre policy in East Bengal and their armed attack on India from West Pakistan.... This led to a moral and political catastrophe the effects of which are still sorely felt. Kissinger’s undisclosed reason for the ‘tilt’ was the supposed but never materialised ‘brokerage’ offered by the dictator Yahya Khan in the course of secret diplomacy between Nixon and China.... Of the new state of Bangladesh, Kissinger remarked coldly that it was ‘a basket case’ before turning his unsolicited expertise elsewhere. 2. Chile.... Kissinger had direct personal knowledge of the CIA’s plan to kidnap and murder General René Schneider, the head of the Chilean Armed Forces ... who refused to countenance military intervention in politics. In his hatred for the Allende Government, Kissinger even outdid Richard Helms ... who warned him that a coup in such a stable democracy would be hard to procure. The murder of Schneider nonetheless went ahead, at Kissinger’s urging and with American financing, just between Allende’s election and his confirmation.... This was one of the relatively few times that Mr Kissinger (his success in getting people to call him ‘Doctor’ is greater than that of most PhDs) involved himself in the assassination of a single named individual rather than the slaughter of anonymous thousands. His jocular remark on this occasion—‘I don’t see why we have to let a country go Marxist just because its people are irresponsible’—suggests he may have been having the best of times.... 3. Cyprus.... Kissinger approved of the preparations by Greek Cypriot fascists for the murder of President Makarios, and sanctioned the coup which tried to extend the rule of the Athens junta (a favoured client of his) to the island. When despite great waste of life this coup failed in its objective, which was also Kissinger’s, of enforced partition, Kissinger promiscuously switched sides to support an even bloodier intervention by Turkey. Thomas Boyatt ... went to Kissinger in advance of the anti-Makarios putsch and warned him that it could lead to a civil war. ‘Spare me the civics lecture,’ replied Kissinger, who as you can readily see had an aphorism for all occasions. 4. Kurdistan. Having endorsed the covert policy of supporting a Kurdish revolt in northern Iraq between 1974 and 1975, with ‘deniable’ assistance also provided by Israel and the Shah of Iran, Kissinger made it plain to his subordinates that the Kurds were not to be allowed to win, but were to be employed for their nuisance value alone. They were not to be told that this was the case, but soon found out when the Shah and Saddam Hussein composed their differences, and American aid to Kurdistan was cut off. Hardened CIA hands went to Kissinger ... for an aid programme for the many thousands of Kurdish refugees who were thus abruptly created.... The apercu of the day was: ‘foreign policy should not he confused with missionary work.’ Saddam Hussein heartily concurred. 5. East Timor. The day after Kissinger left Djakarta in 1975, the Armed Forces of Indonesia employed American weapons to invade and subjugate the independent former Portuguese colony of East Timor. Isaacson gives a figure of 100,000 deaths resulting from the occupation, or one-seventh of the population, and there are good judges who put this estimate on the low side. Kissinger was furious when news of his own collusion was leaked, because as well as breaking international law the Indonesians were also violating an agreement with the United States.... Monroe Leigh ... pointed out this awkward latter fact. Kissinger snapped: ‘The Israelis when they go into Lebanon—when was the last time we protested that?’ A good question, even if it did not and does not lie especially well in his mouth. It goes on and on and on until one cannot eat enough to vomit enough.

When you left you left behind a field of silent flowers under a sky full of unstirred clouds...you left a million butterflies mid-silky flutters You left like midnight rain against my dreaming ears Oh and how you left leaving my coffee scentless and my couch comfortless leaving upon my fingers the melting snow of you you left behind a calendar full of empty days and seasons full of aimless wanders leaving me alone with an armful of sunsets your reflection behind in every puddle your whispers upon every curtain your fragrance inside every petal you left your echoes in between the silence of my eyes Oh and how you left leaving my sands footless and my shores songless leaving me with windows full of moistened moonlight nights and nights of only a half-warmed soul and when you left... you left behind a lifetime of moments untouched the light of a million stars unshed and when you left you somehow left my poem...unfinished. (Published in Taj Mahal Review Vol.11 Number 1 June 2012)