by DANIEL ABDAL-HAYY MOORE

Verily, He causes the sustenance to descend upon me, and I see Him flowing through the whale in the water and through the bird in the sky.
                                                                                                                — Shaykh Abu al-Hasan al-Shadhili

Where am I at this exact point?  There’s a heat wave in Philadelphia, the growly noise of airplanes, my clock with different birdsongs for each hour ticks away, my health is good, my mind troubled but calm… I’ve forgotten my dhikr, but have now remembered it… the prayer on the Prophet, peace of Allah be upon him… as often as I recall, hoping by it to be recalled… by Allah, like a defective automobile to be replaced by an improved model… of my self without such defects… or better yet, by a non-self… letting only Allah...