Dal chhui maala-maal
Dengi was, khaalto laal
Laalas chhu gaashukh kamaal
(Dal is full of riches
Dive in and get the pearl
O my son! I have but been a good mother to you. I have been a cradle to your houseboats. My arms have held your shikaras like babies. I have fed you, nursed you, raised you and loved you as a good mother should. Remember the pambach, the nadur and the gaade. How many of you have I helped swim and how many have felt the warmth of my affection. I have watched you grow from babies to old people. I acted as a playground for you when you were kids, a rendezvous for friends to soak their tired legs. I would host you as love birds and provide an ambience where you would forget your troubles. I have kept you alive, I have kept you kicking. I have posed like a proud mother in your photographs and have been happy even as an unobserved detail in them. I assisted you in earning your livelihoods and raise your families. I never asked anything in return. But why my son, did you never consider me a part of your family? You abused me, ravaged me, poisoned me, hurt me in every way you could. You have brutally encroached my boundaries and violated my sanctity. I have shrunk to more than a tenth of my size. All I asked was to leave me alone, if not care for me, and I would continue serving your needs, the only reason Allah had created me for.
O my son! Listen to my plea, for this might be my last before I disappear into history and become merely a part of an artist’s collection. Help me so that I can help you. It does not take a genius to realize not to chop the branch one is sitting on – or does it!!
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