Stevie G makes me smile. =) Now there’s a proper captain who fully deserves the armband he sports. That’s why I understand how painful it must have been when Patrick Viera and Roy Keane left.
Rafa’s been named Manager of the Month again. Mourning’s becoming difficult now that rationality’s trying to poke its way through.
————–
I asked for more work a few entries ago during a particularly messy mood swing phase. Well, I got what I wished for, and then some. The problem is I’m having a hard time starting on them. My head’s been jammed up with so many self-narrations and thoughts, made-up quotes and phrases, philosophical questions and such, that now I ask for something I know I will greatly regret later on: writer’s block. I seriously need it right now, if only to get to work. Who would’ve thought?
————–
On a whim, I decided some time back to do a little bit of research into the origins of my name. I suppose I’ve always felt a bit disappointed I wasn’t named after any prominent Muslim figures, like Saidatina Aishah r.a who was a great scholar of her time, or Saidatina Khadijah r.a who was Rasulullah’s (peace be upon him) main source of strength and support or even Maryam, the only female name to have graced the Quran.
So I looked it up.
Troubadour poetry is the lyric love poetry which appeared in medieval Spain, in the period from 3rd to 7th centuries A.H/9th to 13th centuries AD which expanded to southern France before moving upwards to northern France. The early Troubadour was a wandering singer or minstrel who travelled from place to place singing to gain a living.
So anyway, the love and mystic in the poetry of Andalusia was seen as unique and was widely celebrated. One of the best examples can be seen in poems by Mahyuddin Ibn Arabi who was a medieval Andalusian mystic poet.
It is said that the most beautiful lines in his works of The Tarjuman al-Ashwaq are the following:
"My heart has become capable of every form:
it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks,
And a temple for idols and the pilgrim’s Ka’ba and the
tables of the Torah and the book of the Quran.
I follow the religion of Love: whatever way Love’s
camels take, that is my religion and my faith.
We have a pattern of Bishr, the lover of Hind and her sister,
and in Qays and Lubna and in Mayya and Ghaylan."
Underneath this he wrote a small commentary as a precaution against any misconceptions of his faith:
"Love, quâ love, is one and the same reality to those Arab lovers and to me; but the objects of our love are different, for they loved a phenomenon, whereas I love the Real. They are a pattern to us, because God only afflicted them with love for human beings in order that He might show, by means of them, the falseness of those who pretend to love Him, and yet feel no such transport and rapture in loving Him as deprived those enamoured men of their reason, and made them unconscious of themselves."
After some heavy mysticism and sufism readings, and a headache later, I continued the search with interest.
It turns out that according to 7th century legend, Qays and Lubna were a married couple who were forced apart by Qays’ father as they had a childless marriage. Qays was forced to re-marry by his father, which he does with another woman by the very same name. The ending’s pretty short and typically tragic: the first Lubna visits Qays and after that brief reunion, both die. That’s it. No details. Nada. Nothing.
I suppose it can be some sort of consolation that the story of Qays and Lubna was interesting enough to be a source of Celtic Legend (read: Tristan and Isolt), their love strong enough to be retold in Andalusian poetry, ancient enough to be romantic, and tragic enough ala Romeo and Juliet…but one can’t help feeling a little frustrated there isn’t more to it than that.
But then again, perhaps a little satisfaction can be taken from the fact that Lubna was part of a symbol of tragedy in love and romance. I hear the stage calling. Ah, the Drama Queen speaks. Haha. I may have found why I have artistic tendencies.
I managed to find a piece of poetry Qays once wrote for Lubna. Its in Arabic, and I’ll leave you to find the translation for yourself. ;)
Ironic, that he should speak of the Moon.
Enough said here.
XOX~
