Pledge of Love Rumi
vegetables and memories

Intermittent nights...

Dinner is ready. Well laid out, on the table. Debby welcomes her father-in-law with Rumi. Before enjoying the evening meal, Ustadz Irsyad was a little stunned.

"Sayur bitter." Mumbled He.

"Why Bi? Abi doesn't like veggies?"

"Likes, nduk. I have not eaten for a long time. You rarely cook this vegetable."

"Hehehe, it's because Debby doesn't like it. But make it never mind."

"Alhamdulillah then. Abi ate ya."

"Yes Bi, please."

They began to get busy with their respective side dishes, the sound of clinking spoons and forks was heard, along with the sound of ceramics rubbing stainless steel objects in both their hands.

Read the meal prayer at the beginning, then insert a spoon. Ustadz Irsyad was silent for a moment.

Remembering one time.

## flashback is on

"waduh, koyo manganese brantawali. Astagfirullah." he muttered. He wanted to protest more than that, when the small war on the problem of kneading bitter melon before processing, while Rahma did not want to. He thinks doing that is a waste of time. What is, after the bitter melon is cut thin he immediately washed it then cooked.

"don't protest macem-macem, just eat. Rahma's cooking cape."

"Yes... Yes eat. Vegetable flavor mahogany seeds."

"mrs Irsyad...!"

"good deck means. You eat too."

"I don't like bitter melon." Smirks.

"Vice... Angelo. Who must finish this is the end."

"Kan mas Irsyad who asked for vegetable bitter melon."

"Hmmm... But the dewe' Nek cooks say wegah koe sing cook, Dek? Iso war." *(Hemmm.... But he wants to cook himself. If you don't want to cook, deck? Could war.)

"No need to speak Javanese. Eat...!"

"Yeah..." Answer ustadz Irsyad who then ate it by force.

## flashback is off

Ustadz Irsyad shed his tears, continuing to eat him to the end.

"Abi? Abi okay?" Ask Rumi. Ustadz Irsyad raised his head. He smiled, then grabbed the mineral water in his glass.

"What's Abi?" Ask him after he finished drinking water from a glass in his hand.

"But cry, huh?"

"Come, Debby's food is not good?" Ask Debby to worry.

"Enak... Just Abi want to ask, what was the bitter melon in the first knead with salt?" Ustadz asked Irsyad, Debby shook her head.

"Sorry Bi."

"No papa, this is delicious, Nduk. It's only better if kneaded first with salt. So that the bitter taste is slightly reduced."

"Next time Debby did, Bi. Again sorry."

Ustadz Irsyad moved on, he just smiled. Bringing the dirty dishes into the sink and then washing them clean, after that come out without talking anything more.

"Sister, is Abi angry?" Debby's feeling a little sad.

"I don't think so, honey."

"But Abi looks like that."

"There must be one other thing. He could remember Umma. Because Umma if you cook bitter melon would not like to ngulenin first. He said late."

"What is it?"

"Dear, calm down. That Abi never gets angry when it's a problem like this." Said Rumi trying to calm down, then invite the wife to continue eating.

***

Among the high weeds, and the atmosphere that looks airy and beautiful full of silence. Ustadz Irsyad stood in the middle of the field.

Looking to the left and to the right, wondering. What is this place?

He also walked slowly, until he reached the end of the field which was actually still very wide.

On seeing her a woman was playing on a swing, her face beaming, with a slim, beautiful body. The girl smiled, staring at the direction of Ustadz Irsyad.

Where he was just fixated, staring longingly at the young woman in white, who kept looking at him.

A few minutes passed, Ustadz Irsyad woke up in his sleep. He's dreaming, yes... The woman he met in a dream, was Rahma in her youth. Beautiful Rahma, Rahma who has her sweet crescent smile. In the lyrics the clock on the wall, still showing twelve o'clock at night.

He then raised his hands in prayer, with tears flowing down from his eyes. Quite swift, even to the point of scattering wet his cheeks, up to his thin beard.

There is a feeling of gratitude, and a hope, it is a dream that means good.

After that he touched his chest that thumped when he remembered the beautiful face of Rahma in his dream. As if his longing for more and more control of his soul, he came down from the bed, walked towards the wardrobe, looking for something that was either still there or not.

Yep... A muslim kebaya. The white clothes Rahma wore when she married him. He smiled, his clothes hanging with dusty plastic. Ustadz Irsyad took it out right away. Then hanging it near the bed, not doing anything excessive, he just looked at it.

"Yes you used to be slim, yes, this is a very small shirt. MashaAllah." Ustadz Irsyad recalled the first day he looked at Rahma's face, which returned his gaze with ogah-ogahan. The first beautiful night, decorated with the attitude of Rahma, and also the way Rahma avoids his views by murmuring.

"They're you, Deck. At the point of view of the husband even upset." Ustadz Irsyad chuckled as he grabbed a bolster pillow, then laid his body in a slanted position hugging a pillow while one hand he made a cushion. "Your grandfather there is more beautiful, just wait a day. Don't want to be paired with a more salient one. Mas will change more salih so it can be the same you continue."

Those words were only to calm his soul that was being stricken with longing feelings. Because he also understood no matter how the afterlife is only the secret of Allah SWT.

While we in the world can only try to be people who do not lose. To serve as the servant of God who believes, in the hope of being free from the torment of hell and eternally happy in the true place where man lives.