This morning I received this poetic wisdom from my teacher Prof Dr Wan Mohd Nor bin Wan Daud, a Fellow of ISTAC. Immediately,I got his permission to post it here so that my fellow readers can enjoy and benefit from reading and contemplating its meanings.By the way, he asked me to qualify himself that he is not a professional poet,only a teacher.Talking about my teachers, Prof Dr Wan Mohd Nor is one of my best teachers that had enlightened my understanding of Islam.Thank you,Sir for your kindness.Jazakallahu Khairan
To My Students
By
Wan Mohd Nor Wan Daud
You have drained your mother’s tears
And denied your spouse’s warm embrace
For months and years
With cold sweat and silent prayers
Seeking neither reward nor praise
Except God’s pleasure and grace
Scaling the summit of the academic prize
Is full of slippery ravines and tricky slopes
So pardon me for this unsolicited advice
A tonic of grave warnings and great hopes:
On your shoulders lies the ummah’s adventure
In your hearts springs Islam’s future
So strive hard, get your doctorate
But never ever be a hypocrite
Master your courses, finish your thesis
Betray not trust nor break a solemn promise
And strive even harder to be a professor
Publish your findings and contemplation
But never ever be a traitor
Just to secure a promotion
To colleagues of greater ability
And works of higher validity
And usher an era of spiraling mediocrity:
Committees and meetings can’t hide
The emptiness inside
Be true to true teachers
Who build schools and characters
Whose thoughts and ideas are Heaven’s gift
To souls floating adrift
Let not your vain desires conspire
And destroy a noble empire
A garden of the learned and virtuous
Now an altar of the greedy, the ambitious
This religion
Spreads its sweet fruits and soft fragrance
From the souls of Mustapha’s real heirs
This nation
Manifests God’s Love, Omnipresence
With happy masses and wise leaders.
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