“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit. Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”- Omar Khayyam
A dream came to a Shepherd boy one day
Was told of a magnificent treasure that
belonged to him
Existing within the pyramids of Egypt
He confided into a gypsy woman who
Never seen or had knowledge of these monuments
Yet, she told him to claim such a treasure
Along the way he met a King
A 200 year old Alchemist whose life force grew young
The grand elixir
The Lazarus pit
The philosopher’s stone
That cling to his soul like Ankhs to Pharaoh’s sarcophagus before tomb
Told him “Those who don’t understand their personal legends will fail to comprehend their teachings”
Maktub
Translated from Arabic it means “It is Written”
So follow your path
Fore Allah told you in that dream to Become a Warrior of the Light…
My mother is an Alchemist
An alchemist has the ability to make gold from the worthless
She, be the alchemist to forge light from where it cease to exist
How she is able to make a home from park bench
Make meal from crumbs when stomach touches
How she can make life form from dust
And dark matter
Blow breath into a son who was made to become soldier of the light
Maktub, It is Written
I remember the first time she showed me how to perform alchemy
I was a young boy crying over the shards of broken dreams
That left me bleeding in iron murky puddle
She grasped my juvenile hands
kissed my forehead
And interlocked them within her own.
That nite
She took what was broken of mine
And transmuted into a prayer
Taught me God’s name
And it is defined as “Causes to Become”
Maktub .“It is Written”
Have you ever watched how a mother teaches her son to pray?
How bed frame on bent knees
And Buzz Lightyear bed sheets can suddenly become a temple
Become the house where Jehovah rests his head
Have you ever really watched-
How she prays for your happiness before her own?
How she forged Zion from your soul
Jerusalem’s cascade overflowing flooding soul’s gateway
While it rains upon your crown
Maktub. It is Written
She transmuted a father out of her own shadow
When the physical of mine went absent
To be raised by a single mother who sacrifices her own life force for my own
Happiness
There would be days when we roamed
Like nomads searching for oasis
While watching my mother age
Like time stands still
Her skin forged of rose gold armor
That never cracked
Fighting off the demons that tried to separate us
Judicially saying she was unfit to raise me
In those conditions
Maktub. It is Written
That God will be with us
Walk us through these wars
She be the Alchemist to turn
Hell fire to oven
And always feasted
The Alchemist is now married
Found her fate with a man who
Also taught me how to perform
This practice
This magic…
Her armor cracked one night
Sobbing immensely in a mirror
holding up a picture of a man
Whose face reflected her very own
Tear stained newspaper clippings
Of a phantom face haunting ink
The pieces of her armor
shattered to floor like glass
She was naked and wallowing
In a pool of murky iron and tears
I walked in her room
grabbing every single broken piece
cupped them within our bloody hands
Transmuting them into a prayer
- W.I.B.