Dear God,
My name is Bara.
I know you already know that.
I know I’m also supposed to make salah to you not iPhone letters.
I know you already know that, but you also already know that was I was gonna say you know that and everything but anyway. Focus.
Rabbina I’m writing to you because for some reason you made me really good at this writing thing and so i guess this is how we’ll talk since i missed maghrib. Promise I’ll make it up inshallah. I love you.
I sat down, turned on la mer by charles trenet, found a Champs-Elysees ambience and started looking for a happy place.
Ok so I tried to, but someone sent me the funniest meme on instagram and so i just responded to it real quick and then i went back to my happy place. Happy place happy place. Listen to the french.
The words dip in and out of my AirPod ears, im hot air ballooning over the Rennes river in Paris, dressed faconnable as i should be.
Auburn anthems are sung by songbirds who hover near my flight finding footsteps in the air that it took humans thousands of years to find.
Naturally i say subhanallah and mashallah all in one.
Sailing under me in a venetian gondola are two melanated friends who have found a string of french geese, (who are calicoe colored versions of canadian geese and quack in an accent) within the river. The couple feed the ducks. At the Shoreline the banks of the river I see three men standing arguing over I don’t know why but I am assuming something important given their gestures. The balloon conductor finds my awe amusing while subtly smiling. I told him it’s different from up here.
It’s different from up there my problems my neighbors dying child my Somali brother Pakistani sister friend from Kosova displays and engineers refugee from Kenya my Malaysian friend my rohingya war torn my money those aren’t even mine those are gods and I sit here in egotistical obsession with myself questioning whether or not God I had the best out for me by giving me the family I had by giving me the school that I was in by giving me by giving me by giving me she’s giving me I am not doing anything and I’m being given and then when I do something I’m giving more I had no part to play in my parents teaching me how to bike or read or write in pen this letter to you God I had no power as a child when my mother could’ve left me on the side of an alleyway like some black children are in the side of a war like some Iraqi children are in the side of everything in the side of in your side of magnificence you decided that I wouldn’t just be a random forgotten you brought me through so many different phases of life and they have the gall to question Your existence when something bad kind of happens.
Why are you breaking down like this the conductor asked me I told him you should know what it feels like to be so so enveloped in the world at a level and every day having to go somewhere in the stratosphere and see that whole world shifted
God I tried to learn from the prophet and I won’t stop but I lie and he’s honest I cheat and he doesn’t when I needed an essay when I was a sophomore I wrote down answers on the notepad scribbled out what I needed and brought that little note in with me to the exam room
God I know on the day that I meet you there’s no notepad I can’t scribble I can’t right and you see me on my worst days. The days when even my mom doesn’t want to talk to me the days when even my friends think I’m just a useless jerk the days when the days when the days when you control every day. Even the days when I laugh even the days when I sit around and don’t even bother to ask about you about whether you love me still or about anything but I’ll pick up my hands and ask you give me I want I need an even on those days you’re happy you told me that all you want from me is to ask you and I can’t even do that I complain I whine I have problems and I don’t even ask you you you you you I point the finger and I say it’s your fault you’re the reason why I can’t be there because of this and this is usually because of you
I’m back on earth god. I’m farther from you. I’m going to hurt a lot of people I’m going to do things that people will hate me because of I won’t make my mom happy I won’t do so many I won’t I won’t I won’t do this I won’t I won’t I won’t even I won’t even learn from this time that I got closer to you I’ll come back down here in sooner than later I’ll mess up sooner than later I won’t make you look at me in a place of good sooner than later I’m going to break someone’s heart tear someone’s mind open with insoles I’m going to sooner than later sooner Then later I’ll be back God closer to you I just hope the next time comes and I’m at least a little bit better than I was the last time I love you God I hope you still love me back
Signed,
Bara
