I Can't Pretend Anymore Poem by Mohammad Younus

I can't pretend anymore,
nor linger in complaint—
wishing for more,
yearning for hands that stretch
beyond what life has placed before me.

For too long, I measured
the shadows of desire,
counting absences,
naming them curses,
while blessings whispered softly.

Life, as it stands,
has gifted me more than enough.
There is abundance in the simplest things—
a roof to hold the rain at bay,
bread that yields beneath my touch,
and garments that warm my bones.
With these alone, I thrive,
wearing joy upon my lips.

No tears fall for what I lack;
the emptiness they seek to fill
is an endless well.
Gratitude alone flows—
the river that knows its way home.

Why blame fate's gentle hand?
Somewhere within, I have always known—
I am whole.
Even in the absence
of every illusion once craved,
the light of sufficiency endures.

I stand not in deficit,
but in the fullness of now,
recalling the verses—
of Surah al-Takathur:

'O man,
you are obsessed
by greed for more and more,
until you go down to your graves.
Nay, in time you will come to understand!
And once again:
Nay, in time you will come to understand!
Nay, if you could but understand
with an understanding of certainty,
you would indeed, most surely, behold
the blazing fire!
In the end you will indeed,
most surely, behold it
with the eye of certainty:
and on that Day you will
most surely be called to account for
the boon of life! '

—MyKoul