We were at a qiyam ul-layl, a night spent at the mosque in the remembrance of Allah. We were in the men’s prayer hall, and there were no men. One of the girls was lying very still on the carpeted floor, face up. Khala Hala demonstrated how a person should be washed, in the Islamic manner, in anticipation of burial.
If you’d have beheld us then, you’d have seen a dozen or more girls with dry throats and sober expressions.
Unlike most reminders, this one was not concerned with the drama or metaphysics of death itself. It dealt strictly with post-mortem mechanics. And though death was hardly mentioned, it was implied at every step.
In my community, few women know how to wash bodies. Even fewer actually do it. Khala Hala was one of them.
But Khala Hala wasn’t known to me for her strength at the thirteenth hour. I knew her in life, among the living. It is hard to think of the mosque without her, in fact.
She was there often. Every Saturday practically, sitting Indian-style in the first row on the women’s side.
She had a large, expressive pair of eyes that, when fixed upon you disapprovingly, made you melt into a puddle. Conversely, those beautiful eyes when smiling radiated warmth, thawing the ice between friends.
Khala Hala was the kind of woman who called out the bluff of even the toughest ‘ammus (uncles). They were like Rapunzel before her, caught in the act. A stern look from her could make them stop mid-sentence and withdraw their tumbling words. And, like a Madonna, a simple nod from her was redemption.
Khala had a voice like a yardstick that put naughty Sunday School children back in their seats. A voice that shepherded the wandering gaze from the open mosque doorway to the greener pastures of a chalkboard where Arabic letters grew like stalks of wheat. I taught at Sunday School beside her. My students left with the scent of baby powder still on them. After making it through the next class — Khala Hala’s — my rose-cheeked kindergarteners emerged with a different glow. She turned them into resilient little creatures that did not hide in their tortoise shells when assaulted. Like Red Bull, Khala Hala gave them wings.
Khala Hala wore the kinds of large home-sown scarves that fluttered in the wind and gave her an eye-catching grace, even as she swooped down to catch a running child in her arms.
She was one of the first khalas (aunties) to transform her Motorola phone into a hands-free device, tucked into her hijab. Khala Hala improvised and Bluetooth plagiarized.
I feel like it’s been years since I’ve been to my mosque — the playground of my childhood and the Saturday-night club of my adolescence. Since college, my mosque visits have become more scarce, with months in between. That’s why every time I go, I register all the small alterations that combine to give the mosque an altogether new look: a fresh forest-green carpet in the women’s prayer hall; a bulletin board design that’s new to me but sun-bleached with age; a new line of young impressionable evergreens; a don’t-run-over-the-kids sign.
When I return — if I return iA — I don’t know if I’ll recognize the place.
Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) praised a person whose heart is mu’allaq (attached; hanging) to the mosque. And, when I enter the main prayer hall where Khala Hala used to hold her Sunday School classes and attend Saturday night lectures, I know something will be awry. One of the longest-standing light fixtures there — that modest yet sparkling chandelier — will be gone.
–
Allah yirhamha. May Allah have mercy on her.
