bahr-l-ghurbat

bahr-l-ghurbat (The sea of Estrangement) -- Introduction

Here the announcement for bahr-l-ghurbat (The sea of Estrangement): We name this horizon bahr al-ghurba, the Sea of Estrangement. A bahr of bu’d that becomes maqam al-qurba. A distance, not a distance from homelands, nor from al-umm al-fatima, the weaning mother, mothertongue, motherland, but the distance of the heart from its inner house. Al-ghurba is to walk among people and al waheysh, among the wild and the wahsha of the world, and your heart finds its dwelling in no face. Al ‘aarifun say: exile is not to leave one land for another; exile is to grow distant from the One who makes every land, a bayt and a manzil, a house and a home. Here we listen to those who live in-between, in the barzakh: workers, aabiri sabil, guests of al-Rahman, measuring qurb and buʿd, not with maps, but with breaths nafass and words, with shath across wires and ether, and with the watery waves of sound. This is bahr al-ghurba: a small radio for those who have gone far, for the floating and the wandering, salikeen in search of some kind of qurb, in water, in bahr al Iilm, seeking a shore inside the echo.