A mystical wayfaring, Poetry in motion.
Seeking Barhama,
Cover art 🖼️ Seeking Barhama ©️ by Bá Sabouke
No foods without salt, and to us the spiritual salt is in Medina Baye with Barhâm! This collection of Poems by an earnest Seeker is a sea of thoughts. In this sojourn we find the Murid tired and trying it is believed, one cannot find rest with rest or peace with peace.
The 31 poems at hand comes with flavors, themes and a resounding scene. Shaykh Mallam Tijjani Usman (Na Yan Mota) yearned for Barhama in Mimiyyah Book, and through Goran Faydah the 19 poems of Shaykh Balarabe Haruna Jega dived into his divine flood, to serve all the ever flowing waters of grace in pool of exoteric writings. Scene after scene we are left wondering, not all wanderers are lost. I’m not sure this is your right book review.
Bá joins on-line with our predecessors in search of (Beloved) Barhama whiles trapped in an orbit of a luminous Qibla. A station that cannot be walked by mere feet except through night vigils roadmapped by a master metaphysician.
We come to terms with constant spinning word by word, poem, and next poem — like a lightning-flash, seldom still or persisting. I feel immersed by the book with high hopes that, Sabouke will find solace once an experience is collated, we are related because “what you seek is seeking you” —Mawlana Rumi.
And we read:
“So the Caller summon the vicegerent Of the Meccan Light — succor of the last umma Go, ya Gausul A’zam, be the promised flood And overflow hearts and souls with certainty and love Go, you are the flood that fills the world With secrets of Divine reality.”
One could say, the Poet has tasted death like the recent martyrs in Kaduna during Mawlid celebration. And only the people of spiritual experience (ahl al-adhwāq) would understand. Mass burial and scarcity of shrouds in the age of over abundance. A white garment that is always available in the daily tijani recital and remain a focal point to remind us of death, everyday.
Tudun Biri Maulud celebration where hundreds were martyred, innocent blood spill in this honorable sitting of mystics by mistakes of military drones droning on holy night. May our souls find rest in zikr and good acts.
But the “Meditation” poem of Sabouke leaves one wondering how and why and who is Bá seeking?
“Wheresoever you turn is the Countenance of Allah” (2:115)
I end with my favorite poem:
God being so good brought to us, an overflowing bounties from the bellies of Black Africa. To make journeys short, each town got its fair share of divine deputies and like magnets they attracted tensions. Quench(ing) our thirst in his river of Faydah. The shinning sage dispensed gnosis and made a compulsion,
“Whosoever does not attain the knowledge of the Merciful (Allah)
His life has been spent in ruin for all time spent.”
“Whoever has no teacher, his leader (imām) is Satan.” Sufi Axioms
Short Bio of Shaykh Barhama Niasse Al-Tijani
Shaykh Ibrahim Niasse was born in 1900 at Tayba after ‘Asr prayer on a Thursday afternoon, in mid Rajab, 1318 A.H. His mother M’am Astou Diankha and Abdullahi Niasse, were in delightful goodness, and us the reader of this chapbook: In merry of the One who was destined, and He came to nourish the Spiritual Path to Godliness.
﷽
- By the time, Al ‘Asr!
- Lo! Man is in a state of loss;
- Save those who have faith and do righteous deeds, and counsel each other to hold on to truth and counsel each other to be steadfast.
At 20 the Shaykh wrote a treatise called Ruhul Adab, the Spirit of Good Morals admonishing himself, Muslims and Tijani brotherhood to flee from falsehoods by adhering to truth, teaching right and doing right. Went further to expound on Sufi thoughts emphasizing,
“Secrets are in the hearts of the distinguished folk (rijāl), not in the bellies of Books.”
The aim of Sufi poetry is to bridge the gap between sacred and mundane getting closely to our spiritual needs. Get your copy on,
Thank you for reading.
