Achilles Heel

Indeed,

It appears to me,

That we all have our achilles heel,

For some there can be countless,

For others not so many sparkle,

But one shines for all –

unparamounted with others.

They were princesses by birth,

She was a teacher,

He was boi emerging on to adulthood,

They were NRAs, abroad to study,

They were sisters, constrained to certain prerequisites of being part of an upbringing.

All culturally diverse,

Ethnically cocktail-ed up,

Blended with western-ness,

Cherry-ed on top with their individual culture,

Yet they all moved,

Step by

Step

With the same hang UP.

It’s the age all concern,

Nature Versus nurture…

Some can rise above these,

And unlearn the lessons given to them,

By right of birth –

The princesses didn’t know any better,

As they stared to their right,

And then to their left,

They were maturing under conditions befitting to their

Current culture,

And in this ignorance,

Their achilles heel was left,

Un confronted,

Preoccupied by the material satisfaction

And nafs’ alike glistened with the acquisition

Of superficial satisfaction.

Meanwhile…

The teacher decided to displace herself from familiarity,

And on occasional visits home,

Treaded on eggshells among those whom she herself

Had raised, in solace

She shone carefree,

In familial company she was restricted,

But she ensured this was temporary,

And then off she went,

Leaving those she nurtured,

Un-nurtured by what she had felt befitted the occasion.

Then…

There was the boi,

Confused,

Dossing,

Bored,

Perplexed by the trepidations that had led him to this point in his life,

Confuzzled by the lack of prosperity encircling,

In spite of his familial material wealth,

Uninspired by his skills,

Searching for shortcuts,

Then taking rest,

And then not bothering to compete with the name,

That his father had made for himself,

He had a complex which he could not shake off,

He had been raised here, and there,

And in these environments, he somehow learnt lessons

That needed to be unlearnt,

And no matter the good company,

He pulled away,

Clinging to his nurturing as an excuse,

For his current numbed existence.

And then…

There were the NRAs,

Matured in a certain context,

And then driven by familial expectations,

Departed their homes,

Into the hub of what until then,

They had envisioned in transitory holidays,

And of course in streaming movies online.

They had arrived,

In the West,

And out went what their nurturing had nurtured.

Whilst mixing merriment with more

Merriment,

They indulge in indulgences,

And find themselves confuzzled,

When they return home,

To their hub,

Some find religious clarity,

Others continue to live a double life,

With nicknames,

And double fbook profiles,

Nurture being able to access one profile,

And their newby nurture able to access another.

And finally…

There were the sisters,

Driven to succeed in an avenue that they had never felt would be where they would head,

Unmarried, they left familial snares unconfronted,

Cultural cries of the aging maiden circumumbulated their familial home,

Yet in spite of failed attempts of satisfying this concern,

They struggled,

They scattered to different locations, worldwide,

And then reflected,

And then together unlearnt lessons that need not have been learnt,

Religion was the key,

Education was their saviour,

And so they clasped each other’s hands,

And took from their culture only that which helped them,

The rest was left to spirituality,

They found in he who was known in the eleventh century

As the Proof of Islam.

In this way,

Each story shows how we are all haunted by the same,

A shared achilles heel,

And the challenges we face,

Ridding ourselves of things we need not learn,

And taking caution in shaping ourselves,

Fashioning us to reflect the goodness befitting us as creations of the One and Only.