Lalla-Aicha Adouim
Tales from the old deen
We speak not, lest we wish men with stones
To happen on us, dragging us into Al-Jahim,
For they will say we are wretched, cursed
Because we did not forget the sins of old
And the way the rivers bleed dum,
The glint in the eyes of men as they watched old eadn
Turn to ashes and rise back to Al-Jennah
Where Allah cried at the folly of men
And tasked us women to remember
The first iteration of the earth,
When humanity bathed in the waters of al-sahar,
The mystic art of Jennah,
Which now grants us the simple gift of voice
For we were told not to speak,
But were not forbidden from the song
Of the Muses and of Israfil,
Who perhaps plays the most beautiful song of all,
Music which has impregnated us
With the lives and memories of the sayyidas
That came before us, let us sing now of sayyida Zarqa,
The one of Al-Yamama,
Who knew of the future before it was woven.
In the days of dune, when desert flowers still bloomed,
And the winds of the sahara did not yet blow
Like knives tearing at the skin of man,
When the Bedouin still roamed free
Before cannons and ghostly men were brought by shaitan,
And the sands still glittered with the golden footprints of Adam,
The girl of Al-Yamama,
The one we know as the sayyida Zarqa,
Meditated on the crest of the Sahara,
Silent as she walked through the gardens of time,
For she, not Delphi, was man’s first oracle,
A precious gift from Jennah,
So that man may be protected from dum,
That was the blessing of Zarqa Al-Yamama,
Whose gift was marked by her golden blue eyes,
The eyes of wahaya.
On the crest of the sands she sat,
Her white garb soaking in the sunlight
So that she may feel the power of Allah,
Which in the old deen lied in the rays of the sun,
And walk through time as she sat, waiting
For men with blackened hearts that rode with shaitan
To reveal themselves to her
Seven nights before they would unsheath their sabers upon her tribe;
Oh Zarqa, the one of Al-Yamama,
Pray that you walk the seven layers of Jennah,
How blessed you were for beings the eyes of wahaya
And warning your tribe of sullied men
Who wish to infect your people with terror and blood,
For this was how they prospered amongst the dry dunes,
Scurrying with their sabers and thirst,
Butchers of shaitan.
O blessed sayyida Zarqa, the one who protects,
Al-oum to her people of the sand,
For years your eyes watched from your burning throne
‘Till mousy men began to hide behind trees
In foolish belief that you will not see their sabers
And their thirst for dum,
But you had the eyes of wahaya,
Holy and miraculous
Before any the of the prophets were known,
Cleverness measuring past that of sayyida Athena,
How easily did you see the moving trees
And know that black-hearted men hid behind them;
Quickly, you ran from your throne
To tell your people, your children, of the moving trees,
The butchers of shaitan that lurked among them,
But men know not of a woman’s wisdom,
Oblivious they are to her reasoning,
Delighting instead in mirth and wine,
Leaving blessed Zarqa to give tears to the earth,
As they heed not her warning.
Dum and shaitan found her people,
Slaughtered on the sand they were,
Causing the great dunes to collapse,
As butchers delighted at their red-soaked hands
And partook in the orgy of murder
Of the people of Al-Yamama.
Blessed sayyida, O how she fought
With what powers she could derive from the Heavens,
But one is nothing to ten thousand.
The one the butchers called great and glorious king,
He tore out the eyes of wahaya,
Threw them into the dark pits of shaitan
So that they may never see again,
So that blessed Zarqa may never see,
Gone were her golden blue eyes, the gift of Jennah,
For every king knows
That a powerful woman rains doom
On those who cut her,
So upon her crest the king lay a crucifix
Which our sayyida was nailed to,
Left to turn into the dusts that pillaged dune,
Her life ending upon a scene of horror,
But Allah has mercy for the souls of a woman
Who lived only to see and protect,
And He made her into the Mother of Earth,
For now the blue of her eyes is that of our rivers and skies
Which flow as the veins of the land,
And her warnings still come
Through the tides of the storm and the sea,
Telling us to be wary of men
That hide and ride with shaitan.
*Arabic translations
deen = religion
shaitan = devil
Al-Jahim = hell
Al-Jennah = heaven
Al-oum = the mother
Dum = blood
Allah = God
Lalla-Aicha Adouim is a second-year majoring in Data Science from Queens, NY. She reads way too many comic books and believes that cereal is soup.
