“In your light I learn how to love. In your beauty, how to make poems. You dance inside my chest where no one sees you, but sometimes I do, and that sight becomes this art.” – Rumi
Mona ran a mile a day. It felt good. To hit the pavement, drown out the noise, ignore the pangs of her beating heart. Her heart beat for Morocco…
Morocco taught Mona so many things: how to laugh, how to cry, how to paint the town with her smile.
What Morocco didn’t teach her was how to move on…
Mona took a rest on top of Kaushal hill. That was her spot overlooking the marketplace. She saw merchants selling goods, little children laughing as they played hide-and-seek, and the older folk catching up on the latest news of the day.
Mona missed Morocco. Whenever she was with Morocco, she felt unstoppable. She noticed a tear make its way down her cheek. “Stop that,” Mona chided inside. “It’s not like I won’t ever see Morocco again.”
She sighed deeply. A sigh that only one who’s ever experienced a broken heart can understand.
Mona remembered Morocco’s parting words, “I will always be here, in your heart. Never farther than a thought, a whisper, or a heart beat away. If you remember, I will always come forth…”
“Yeah, easy for you to say,” she murmured to the air around her.
Mona felt free in Morocco’s presence. She danced to the music only her ears could hear. She smiled at the world, and the world smiled back at her. Mona knew that her light only grew stronger with Morocco, but her light had always been there. Morocco was a blessing in Mona’s life…
“Is a blessing…” she corrected aloud.
Mona took a small stick laying next to her. She started to draw aimlessly in the grass before her. “I will see Morocco again. It’s only a matter of time.”
Time: the ever-elusive mystery that scientists, lovers, and philosophers, reminisce about over and over.
Time will reveal all, she learned in her studies.
As she was drawing random shapes in front of her, Mona remembered lessons she and Morocco learned together:
Each person has their own journey in life, and while I can celebrate others’ journeys with them or share in their sorrow, they each have their own responsibility to their path and evolution… as do I.
I shouldn’t dim my light for others to feel good about themselves. Instead, I can use my light to spread goodness and help someone else recognize the beauty of their own light.
Morocco did just that. Morocco lit up the sky…
Any time I choose love, I choose correctly.
She chuckled at this one. Mona remembered hearing this at 21 years old. Now years later, she appreciated the wisdom of those words.
In the end, the answers you are seeking will all make sense. But until then, be the best you there is and trust that the One who created you knows what’s the best for you…
Mona heard a bell in the distance and came out of her reverie. The clock tower. 6 o’clock. She started to gather herself to make her way back home for supper.
“I will embrace you with open arms… until we meet again, Morocco,” Mona thought.
Mona brushed off the loose dirt on her clothes while a breeze moved through her long flowing hair. As she stretched her arms and got ready to finish the rest of her mile run, she swore she heard the words, “Keep smiling, little one…”
And Mona did just that: she smiled at only words she could hear… Morocco’s words…