MEET SEEMI GHAZI
I’m 54 years old, I was born in London, England. My Dad was completing his master’s degree in Political Science at the London School of Economics. When I was 31/2 we moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. My dad was doing his PhD. We lived in an amazing place called the Centre of Study of World Religions, which was at Harvard and was founded by my Dad’s mentor William Campbell Smith, who was a great scholar of religion. It was an exciting time, it was the late 60s–early 70s. When you went out to Harvard Square, you’d encounter the Black Panthers, feminist pamphleteers, Hare Krishna’s, you name it. It was a vibrant place to grow up. When I was 16, I was living in the suburbs of Chicago with my parents and my 4 siblings. I was the eldest daughter. I had two worlds. There was the world of my family and my home. I had a world of friends that were South Asian mostly, who were Muslim that I was connected to through a strong, vibrant mosque community, it’s called the Muslim Community Centre, it’s one of the oldest most important American Muslim institutions. We were there every Sunday.
I’ve had 3 or 4 miscarriages–before and after my daughter and son were born. Some of them were early, some of them were late. I think a thing I learned between each of those experiences is that I was able to own the process and was able to be there. To give birth to that child and hold it. Sometimes it was so small, like a seahorse. The last one before I had my son was a perfectly formed baby boy. They’re so tiny, and so perfect. It’s incredible. I feel so whole and healed about it and I think it’s because I really took my time and I honored the process. I held them in my hands and I prayed over them. I wrapped them in white cloth–which is what we do as Muslims–and there’s a place where I buried them all out in nature. A place that is special to me that I can go visit.
Each of those times, people would often say, “Seemi, you’re being so strong.” I didn’t feel like I was being strong. I just felt carried in those moments and felt that the veil between this world and all the other worlds that are unseen became so thin and so fine. I’ve never felt the presence of the beyond so palpably.
