The Scourge of God Came Riding
“I am the scourge of God. If you had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon you.” –Genghis Khan
The scourge of God came riding
Out of the mountains in the north.
Hooves of fire on the parched desert
Clouds of dust rising like sacrificial smoke towards the Heavens
Qari’ah! Calamity! The Striking Blow!
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
Baghdad, jewel of the Ummah
Proud minarets as Babel Towers.
Scholars and poets bloom under Crescent Moon
Young sap cut down by the Scourge of God
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
The ulama pen could not hold back the ink of history written by sword.
The streets run red and the Tigris flows black.
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
Widows’ wails a call to prayer among deserted mosques.
Once great houses and the city square silent amid a million corpses.
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
The scourge of Allah writing words of history across the desert
Every hoof print a terrible harf, a letter
Who will explain to these children? These fatherless? These dead? These massacred?
Of the theodicy of God?
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
How do we measure what has been lost against what has been decreed?
With Him are the keys of the unseen — no one knows them except Him. And He knows what is in the land and sea.
Not even a leaf falls without His knowledge, nor a grain in the darkness of the earth or anything — green or dry — but is ˹written˺ in a perfect Record.
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
He is the One Who calls back your souls by night and knows what you do by day, then revives you daily to complete your appointed term.
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
* * *
When the dust settles.
The bodies counted.
When the streets stop flowing blood
And the rivers are not black with ink.
Among the ruins and destruction,
The barbarians turn their chests towards Holy City
Allahu Akbar
Allahu Akbar
Allahu Akbar
Allahu Akbar
Ashhadu alla ilaha illallah…
Ashhadu anna Muhammadar Rasulullah…
Which of your Lord’s bounties will you and you deny?
I wrote this poem as part of an assignment in an Islamic History class which I am currently attending at Al-Maqasid. I was largely inspired by my recent reading of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian.
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