The rains fell relentlessly on her house,
She ran to take shelter in caves,
And watched the house made of mud
Dissolve in water, drop by drop
As if it was made of sugar
And the sweet water
Took everything with it,
every strip of dry cloth she had
And every grain of food
She slumped back into herself,
Closed her eyes, and prayed
If only I had a house
That no water could get into
That could have a warm fire blazing
No matter what blizzards howl outside
That would stand still
Even in the calm after the storm
You can have that house,
Said her goddess
But it will destroy
A little bit of the earth
The earth, it is meant to be
Renewed every season
What the rains wash away
It would have deposited on river banks
And the mud would have gone back to earth
Grown up in flowers and fruits and trees
And in the place of what you had lost
you would have created anew
But this house that you ask for,
It will not be destroyed
It will stand there
And stand and stand
The waters that would have
flowed over it
Will have to flow around it
When you are gone
The house will not be
Destroyed and rebuilt,
as it should
But it will exist for
far longer than a season
And when it finally dies
As all things should
It will not come back to life
As all living beings would
It will exist, in hard and brittle
Concrete bits and pieces
That nothing can grow out of
That will not go back into the earth
Wherever they go,
they will take death with them
For renewal every season
Is the ritual of life
And this house of yours
Will flout that rule
It will be an aberration
On the map of the earth
The earth is large, mother
And I am but a tiny one, a nothing
You can grant me as much earth
As one point of a pin
So that I can be safe
In one lifetime
What is one point of a pin,
To the great world?
And what is one lifetime
In the great flow of time?
Nothing, mother, nothing
And so the house was made
Not by borrowing from the earth
And the river and the Forests
Mud and stones and wood and water
That would have gone back into them
But by hacking and plundering
And accumulating and stealing
Sand and marble and other things
That would never go back
Where they came from
That would never
grow anything ever again
That would, even when destroyed
Continue to hinder and obstruct
The rains and the winds and
Seeds and little saplings
Every item a plunder
Every step a crime
A sin against the mother earth
And yes she was happy
To be safe for a lifetime
It is just as big as a pin point to you,
Mother earth,
She said
And the pin point is nothing,
Nothing,
In someone as great
And munificent as you
Can you not give your daughter
A little point of a pin?
Yes daughter,
But don’t you see?
I have so many daughters…
Cried mother earth
But she shut the doors of her house
And went inside to warm up
By the blazing fire
***
And she continued to ask
From her goddess
And from mother earth
Which were maybe one and the same
Things that would
Make her safe for a lifetime
And leave a legacy
Of death and destruction
***
Will you fill up every inch of me, child?
The mother asked with tears in her eyes
Will you give me no space to breathe at all?
Will you not think for a moment
Of the sin against your mother?
Her daughter’s jaw was set
And her eyes were fiery
Plenty for some and poverty for others,
Isn’t that a greater sin, mother?
Will you deny me what
You gave to your other daughters?
