At different, different times of the day, but mostly at night, I would imagine what you might be doing, at this precise moment when I am here, far away.

I imagine you cross-legged on the floor, your back against the edge of bed, hunched over the Quran. If I close my eyes, I can hear your voice as you recite the Words and meanings, I can hear your voice, the gentle timbre.

Or you would be sitting with the guitar across your lap, plucking not out of sheer talent but fierce determination, slowly, tentatively, each note squeezed out one by one. It would sound jarring, but I would only be looking at your fingers, gliding across the strings.

It is sad to think of you eating lonely meals, in an empty house, in a foreign land. I wonder if at the end of another solitary evening, you would sigh and think of us as you turn off the lights, or if you'd turn off the lights at all. You've always been resolute, but now when you call I can hear desolation chipping away at determination, like drips of water upon a rock. I've always been the one weak-spirited, hysterical and expecting the worst, but this time even I can't afford not to keep my chin up, put my faith in optimism. It's the only way to get through.

mokciknab muttered at 9:42 pm ~ ~