The Endless Golden Dunes

Chapter 15: Thoughts

Ali

It might have been foolish what he was doing.
  
Betraying orders, Ali walked among the shifting dunes. He breathed in heavily, allowing the air to enter his lungs. There was something different about desert air. They weren’t something you can cast aside and say that it is a part of life. No. They were something to observe. They were something to be deemed queer and extraordinary.
  
The feeling that followed the act of breathing alone should tell one about the wonders. There was something sweet about the smell, something that reminded you of a moment in your life that you no longer remember. It makes your mind fill with memories of your first step, your first words, and even the time when you came out of your mother’s womb.
  
But that was the strange feeling. The strangeness in general was much more complex. What was that strangeness? It seemed so … metaphysical? Ali thought that it was the best way to describe it.
  
For a moment, he paused and looked towards the endlessness of the dunes. All he saw were the dunes and their flying sands. So bland, yet so intriguing, as if there was more to the desert than just these dunes that shift.
  
Three months had passed since he and his brother left Makkah, left the familiarities of their life.
  
He went back to the question in hand. What was that strangeness in the desert? What was that specific peculiarity that was tickling his mind, making it reach depths it hadn’t before? Ali was annoyed. There was never a matter that his mind couldn't put into simple words. His wisdom was supposed to rival those philosophers.
  
Wisdom.
  
Ali massaged his temple. Could that be it? Were the dunes hiding something as simple as wisdom? An anger took him. First, the anger was because he couldn’t guess something as straightforward as it. It was for himself. Then he felt angry at God.
  
‘So great of wisdom You are hiding!’ he asked. ‘Why is that? So much knowledge is inside this creation of Yours. Why not release it? So many secrets are inside these golden dunes. Why not reveal it?’
  
There was no response except the wind. Ali started having blasphemous thoughts, but he was wise enough to wave them off. Why should he be a fool enough to challenge the One who created him? He remembered the story of Firaun.
  
He supposed answers could be found sometime later.
  
But while answers to one question began their journey to him, another question came. Was he really here to fight for Him?
  
‘Tell me, my Lord,’ he began. ‘Do I hold a sword because You willed it, or do I hold it because I am forced? You created the threads that carry fate. They intertwine with other threads, loop around some, go through others. Together, with all the threads, short or long, they create an image. That image is the world. Every thread has a purpose in Your grand plan. One of the thousands of millions of threads, only one is mine. What role am I playing? How is this the best possibility for me? What should happen next? Just one drop, my Lord, one drop of Your infinite ocean of wisdom. That is all I ask.’
  
And the answer started its journey.
  
For a moment, Ali laughed. He laughed because what he was doing, none could imagine. What did people think about when they heard his name? A boy with impossible wisdom. And now here he was begging for wisdom from the Lord of Wisdom, Al-Aleem, the All-Knowing. It was humbling for Ali. It reminded him of his mortality and limitations. He was but a human. He was human like Muhammad, like Isa, like Musa, like Ibrahim, like any other great person that ever lived.
  
Oh but how he craved knowledge! Yet, he couldn’t get all of it. He had mentally prepared himself to die illiterate. People will come to his grave and say that he was so wise, yet had a wavering hand when he picked up a pen. Ali didn’t mind it. As long as someone remembered him for even one piece of wisdom, he would be satisfied.
  
Knowledge.
  
Wisdom.
  
Greatness.
  
‘My Lord!’ Ali suddenly shouted. It was a surge of energy that came from nowhere. ‘I am but an ant compared to Your greatness! All I want from You is to know that my life was worth it, that I have fulfilled the purpose that you sent me for. Have I been good? Will I have any regret when the Angel of Death, Izraeel comes to me to take my soul? To filter out anything unnecessary in this request, all I want is a regretless death!’
  
The dunes weren’t silent, but they weren’t speaking as well. No voices echoed back, as if his noises had been swallowed by the sands. Another answer was, hopefully, coming.
  
‘Ali!’
  
A familiar voice. Ali could already imagine Ismael coming to him with a white shawl wrapped around his head, only revealing his eyes. He turned around and saw a man.
  
‘Ali!’ Ismael called again. ‘Akhi! Where are you!’
  
Ali smiled. He looked towards the dunes as if an answer was to come. He closed his eyes for a moment, smelling the air of the desert, tempting it to tickle his nostrils.
  
‘Allah u akbar.’ He whispered.
  
And he went towards the direction where Ismael continued to shout his name.