Shooting Star Poem by Mystic Qalandar

In regions of demon-faced shadows,
I sat, winding my breath inward,
clad in patchwork Sufi robes,
mistaking silence for worship.

For a long time the partial intellect
guided my path—
and in that long, dark night of division
it kept parceling me out
between the rusted collar at my throat
and the shackles round my feet.

Every passage within me
spoke the accent of false selfhood.
The ego, draped in borrowed wisdom,
enveloped me like a vagrant
on a freezing night beneath a cloud-heavy sky
who warms himself with smoke.

Desire came garlanded in the scent of love.
Lust, rage, attachment, pride
became my constant companions.
Like a counterfeit saint
I turned prayer beads
within the ruin of a desolate mosque.

When at last I longed
to flee those dark, dreadful shadows,
I saw they had already
descended into me.

Then I understood why
the old Sufis weep at dawn—
they do not seek deliverance from darkness,
but release
from the darkness inside them.

The secret revealed itself:
some deserts are such
no foot has ever trod.
Some prisons are such
their walls are mirrors.
Some demons are such
they evade every argument—
save for light.

Then I cried:

O Hidden One!
The little lamps of thought
have wearied me.
I burned philosophy
to warm my coldness.
I drank from wells of conviction—
and remained thirsty still.

Now only a shooting star
can save me.
Send that fire—
that ancient shooting star—
not from beyond the skies,
but tearing through
the sealed rooms of the soul.

Let it descend without mercy
on the nests of bats;
let it burn
the dark vines that coil around memory.

Illusion does not leave with courtesy,
and the ego is not swayed by counsel.
Darkness negotiates until
one blow of eternal light
tears it asunder.

Beyond this inner night,
the skies remain alive
as they always were.

وَهُوَ الآنَ كَمَا كَان
(And He is now as He always was)

On every earthly thing
rests the moisture of His light.
He alone—Ever-Living, Self-Subsisting—
manifests in every form:
sometimes as command, sometimes as prayer.

This is the truth:
behind the veil of creation
the Creator reveals Himself.
On the tip of every particle's tongue,
His name trembles.

— MyKoul