When She Was Gone

  All I remember, I was a punctual student. After joining college I gave it another brain storm: Was I a "punctual student" or a "passive student"?
  I think it differs. It carries huge bulky differences within its folds. Being punctual doesn't mean to be as silent as I used to. Being punctual doesn't mean fearing teachers as I felt. Being punctual doesn't mean isolating as I did. I was passive. I was a student, but invisible one. She has her name on the class list, highest grades in her report, but where is she? Her name when it was called out, she had to raise her hand to ensure that this face she had, belonged to that name. She thought it was a part of punctuality, but the adult her found out that it was simply and obviously passivity.

   Days passed and she was lost. She joined a college in a blur. Blurry future in a country whose existence became blurry as well. She didn't know where her dignity and future would be secured. She didn't know what job would polish her prestige. She didn't know what would fulfill her pride. She didn't know where her interests can soar. All what she believed in is, letting her fate drive her to the mysterious destiny.

  Till one day, she.... I mean, I.... had a vision. Like a psychic. A collapsing world in a minute. A past, present and future, interlacing at a point. School buses on the sides of my college's road. Teachers crossing the street, dressed in black. Students from different colleges heading to the mosque. It was the funeral of my school's principle Mrs/ Ameena El-Deeb. The first thought hit me "Why are tears running down on my cheeks? I didn't interact with her. I had a thought back then 'who visits the principle frequently, is a bad kid.' I know it's wrong, cause later I realized honored students do so too. So, am I crying over her death? Or.... Am I crying, actually we may say: tearing, over that student she had once in her school yard, that girl who was under her supervision, that girl whose graduation she attended and handed her prizes, cause she made it to med-school,  the girl who's the very same person attending college, but this time, she's under the literal word which contradicts punctuality?

   Then, the whole picture enlightened in front of me. When I thought of myself as the one who died and she was the one who survived, watching more generations released to build a new world. A Shakespeare moment, right? Actually, what enlightened wasn't the dark imagination I own, but the more important thought which conquered my strength to survive through that day. When I die, who would attend my funeral?

   If my spirit will spread its goodbyes nowadays, I guess barely my friends would know of it, cause I am usually out of sight. My parents will absorb the shock for my little sister, to keep her moving on. Other than my family, who will attend my funeral?

  In a moment, I was stuck among null invisible thoughts in my head. Out of the blue, one word hit me "Teacher." Teachers are really blessed to have us all. I guess, specially, in this era. We communicate quicker, the news spread in a blink of an eye. Of course, this one won't be a cheerful one, but anyway she/he has many to pray for her/him after she/he's gone. I remembered that professor who was mentioned by a four- academic-year-older student and how sad all classes felt for him and how many attended his funeral. The blesses weren't only for him, the students even supported his son who was in his final years of high school.

  When she was gone, I felt the obligation to be a teacher. When she was gone, I felt it's important to be a mother, cause heaven will be yours; but it's more important to teach many: Your kids, their friends, your colleagues and your neighbors too. When she was gone, I realized the name "teacher" equalizes a Queen's honor. When she was gone, I knew my end is more important than my living. When she was gone, I didn't bury the old me along; I thought I have to improve it, so when I give a visit, I'd be welcomed. And this is what happened when she was gone.

Dark Utopia

  I want a ticket to Utopia. I am not waiting for winning it from a lottery. I am not adding it to my bucket list, either. My Utopia doesn't exist in Hawaii. It doesn't exist  in those beautiful islands in the middle of the ocean. It exists in a dark place. Lonely. Its bottom belongs to mother Earth, its top is a whole other planet. I don't want my eyes to roll on the ground to have a look on grass, trees and sand -with all due love to that view. But, I want my eyes to fly. I want it to sway in space, against gravity. I want my soul to drift away with that thin thread magnetized to me, and I keep playing with it like a marionette.

  My Utopia wouldn't be sunny greenish land. It's dark. It's on the top of a mountain, surrounded by dark clouds. I'd stand on the peak. I'd scream, not like a scared girl, but like an angry riot. I'd smile to myself. I'd tear out of happiness I'd feel, because of that freedom I'd touch through the blowing wind. My tears would freeze. My nose would produce warmth all over my face as it gets reddish. I'd laugh out of the madness of this mixture of feelings. I'd shout out all the sorrowful memories. No more whispers. I'd sit and let my eyes jump off this cliff and sink in the beauty of the scene. The green landscape, the sparkling water, the neighboring icy caps of the high mountains, the rocky floor beneath me and the distant sandy spots. Then I'd lift my eyes up high to see how close I am to the sky. The heavy clouds, the sun which keeps visiting from a minute to another and the moon which is too shy to shine in the morning and hard to be its accompany in the presence of these blocking clouds.

  Actually, I don't think my urge to abuse this moment of sweet loneliness would let me sit for long. I would stand and let the wind dive into my hair, tickle my frozen lashes, and try hopelessly to dig into my thick clothes. The voices would sing lullabies to me. Some of them would reply to my worries. Some of them would laugh along with me. Some of them would bring funny moments I had on that planet Earth one day. Some of them would ring the bells on my heart and crave into it the names of people missed, to give them a visit as soon as I'm off this Utopia. Some of them will wash my brain and alert it that life can't be about Utopia. Life can't be comforting. If life would be pure, with no worries, no pain, no madness, so what would heaven be like?

  My dark Utopia isn't sad. It isn't pathetic. It isn't an emo land. My dark Utopia is the thoughts you and I are buried in. If we envisioned them as a place, it would be entertaining. If we kept envisioning it as a knife stuck in our backs, the pain will never end; you'd be like a soul belongs to a dead body which couldn't see the light to settle in its home.

  Utopia doesn't have to be magical. It can be your drawings, your piece of writing or your cover for your favorite song. Utopia can be the invisible angel on your shoulder. It can be anywhere. You create it, you find it.

Free Time

  Free time, is what I suffer from. After you're gone, with a phantom left before me, I've nothing to do, but writing letters to you. None of them are sent. All of them are in my drawers. Every day I meet you, I head back to my room, and read all the letters. I write letters sent to you and replied to me.....by you which, actually, you've never written. I read them in your tune, I understand them the way you'd get it, and write the replying letters in the way you would write it, in the handwriting you'd create.

  I am not desperate. I am not lonely. It is just the way I replaced you with letters and the way you replaced me with empty air, makes me a winner. A heartless winner. My dignity doesn't hold me from knocking on your door. My heart doesn't advise me to stop beating when you're around. It's simply my brain convinced the rest of my existence that hating you is easier than accepting you as a companion in my life.

  Wait, I haven't told you about the content of the letters? They are lyrics. That's what I'd on mind. Every song is about what you'd suffer from by now. Every word is about what I'd say to support. All I had on mind was... lyrics. The ink I had to write these words on these poor papers which has no fingerprints but mine, is the music. Music varied from being crazy, with none resting beats to a piece of soothing music. Some of the words will make you laugh, some of them will make you go insane, some of them will make you quit trying to have revenge from life which you're about to hate.

  So, tell me what do you do in your free time, but escaping the thought of me? I mean, when do you have a time free of me?

Time

  A clock which never stops ticking, like this planet Earth which never stops spinning. A clock which never quits passing by the very same numbers in different nights and days, like history which goes repeating itself but in various centuries. A clock which trespasses your dreams and that's where you can give it a license to enter through the gates into your life as a wallflower company or the lifelong buddy.

  I believe time is a teacher. The teacher whom if you feared, you could never learn from him, and he would be that machine which keeps chopping your grades. A walking nightmare. But, if you respected him and in a friendly way, shared with him your opinions & thoughts, he would give you all what he had willingly, grades and unlimited culture. A map to Utopia.

  So, when you look at the clock, don't determine the numbers. Focus on the time. Nonsense, right? I honestly see it like that: Time is a plain chart, if I kept measuring its height and width, and kept changing my ideas just to fit that size (which will lead to forgetting the originality and the main encouragement of this idea that drove me to it in the first place) instead of, simply, start painting, but in suitable measurements (like minimizing it, to save space and exert all this effort to create new ideas to fill up this space. In my opinion, it's far better than cancelling the whole idea; for an artist, it's frustrating, believe me). Results? I'd be done with my aim effortlessly and gladly.

  It's 11:30 AM now, but who cares about the numbers?! I care that it's morning. I have many things to do, but why would I tell myself "I have no time and I am doomed," while I can simply tell myself, "I can do what I want to do, just faster than I usually do it"? It doesn't mean, I will do it carelessly or I'd exhaust myself (as I have to convince myself that what I am committing is according to my interest and free will), but means I will advance my abilities. Don't let the "nothing" be your monster. Let nature and its acquirement be your loving guardians.