A Creative Response to Islamic Art

The following is a depiction of the word ‘quran’, drawn close to the ear of a person. Quran literally means ‘recite.’ The word written here, in Arabic script, does not mean al-Quran, as in the noun form of the word referring to the holy book. Rather, it takes on the verb form of the word.

The depiction attempts to capture the moment in which Muhammad, on Mount Hira, was told to recite. That was the beginning of the Quran. The readings on recitation emphasized the oral tradition and practice tied to Islam and the Quranic text. The hafiz is the person who is the guardian of Quran, or in other words the person who memorizes and recites the Quran. Even before Arabic had a script, the Quran was transmitted first from Allah to Muhammad, then from Muhammad to his followers, and so on.

I think of this image as tied to the continued tradition of recitation all over the Islamic world. I imagine the impulse or motivation to practice recitation an infinite loop. One hears recitation and is inspired to take it up. When one recites the Quran for others, they too might be inspired to recite. But always, the primal moment of communication, before one can even speak the Quran, one must first hear it.

I thought about representing the word as if it were coming from a mouth, in order to highlight its aural quality as opposed to its written quality. The drawing might suggest that the writing precedes the hearing and then speaking—which is not depicted here. Of course, the written and calligraphic representation of the Quran came last. However, if the word is simply present in the drawing—without a representation of the body of the speaker—then it is possible that the word is spoken by Allah. From many discussions about art and representation in Islamic art, we learned that Allah cannot be represented in any form, known or unknown. In representing the word with no physical speaker I mean to invoke that first moment of listening and then recitation.

Charcoal on paper

Muhammad heard “recite,” and he did,

till his words grew like roots into our souls

I.

The Prophet like a bird takes flight

Returning to the bosom of Allah

The Light of Muhammad persists here

Even as his body falls to the material world

Praise Allah, he sent Muhammad with the Book

So to guide his people from darkness

From sickness into health

From solitude into love

Muhammad heard “recite,” and he did,

till his words grew like roots into our souls

II.

Arabia fell silent that days

His followers’ heads hung low

The ache of melancholy like hunger

In their stomach

Not an eye was dry

But rejoice, we know Allah

Because Muhammad came to us with his words

Muhammad heard “recite,” and he did,

till his words grew like roots into our souls

III.

The day Muhammad went, Allah wept

Even the Beloved knew of earthly suffering

Though he had a mantle about his shoulders

Oh! The immortal light of the Prophet!

The mortal man that is Muhammad

Lives on by our humble imitation

Muhammad heard “recite,” and he did,

till his words grew like roots into our souls

These poems are in response to the poems in praise of Muhammad. I wrote these poems in the style of the mauluds, poems written in veneration of the Prophet’s birth. Maulud actually means “newborn child.” The Sindhi maulud is a short lyrical poem from five to ten lines. The Sindhi maulud begins with a thal, or a verse that generally serves as a refrain.

While the style of these poems is modeled structurally after the maulud, they are different in content. Rather than writing on the birth of Muhammad, I chose to write on his death. The poems based on the Prophet’s birth entail an immense sense of hope, love, of course, and happiness. There is a sense of seeing the world anew. Take this line for example, “Beauteous guidance came into existence when the prince Prophet was born.” In invoking the Prophet’s birth in these poems, he already is the “example” and he already is the one who will guide those who follow him to Allah.

Given that there was so much confusion after Muhammad’s death concerning who would succeed him and, as a result, lead the Muslim community, I wanted to write poems that would hold onto that same sense of hope and guidance that we see in the maulud. For me, these poems imagine a time soon after Muhammad’s death, just preceding the political chaos that would ensue. The poems imagine a time of profound mourning for that loss while expressing extreme gratitude that he came with a message that would last, even though his body did not.

The sense of mourning is the greatest difference between the mauluds and the poems I’ve written. The mauluds are full of happiness, in fact, many of them suggest a sense of having one’s grief subside because of Muhammad’s birth. My poems can be characterized by a shared mourning that must be suffered. We can imagine that all those who admired and followed the Prophet would have uniformly felt this deep sadness at the news of his death. In so doing, the poems signal a hope and need that the community will remain in tact because of the love everyone shared for the prophet.