The Mountains Are Not Calling Today

When Nature Whispers Warnings and We Refuse to Listen

A Saturday Whisper | Reflection 8

ٱلسَّلَامُ عَلَيْكُمْ وَرَحْمَةُ ٱللّٰهِ وَبَرَكَاتُهُ

May this morning rise like a calm prayer in your heart. A healthy happy and happening morning to you and yours. May your limbs stretch without pain. May your home echo with the laughter of those you love. May you breathe deeply and softly into a life of well-being, where each breath is a small thank you for being alive. Ya Allah, grant us peace in our bodies and steadiness in our hearts and keep us safe from what we cannot see.

This morning, the mountains are not calling. No. They are pleading. Whispering through soaked soil and crumbling slopes, begging you to stay away. Stay home. Fold your maps. Cancel the group chat. Unpack the backpacks and let the boots rest.

For the hills have wept all night. Tourists, once enchanted by green pastures and whispering pines, now lie buried beneath the arrogance of seasonless wanderlust. Chilas remembers. Swat is soaked. Gilgit has tasted fear in the muddy waters it never meant to unleash. The valleys had not invited you. They were busy bleeding. And yet you arrived, clicking selfies with storms.

Families in Punjab have wept their goodbyes to children washed away in canals that overflowed like unattended grief. Landslides have gulped down cars the way nightmares swallow sleep. Roads collapsed. Tourists vanished. Villages disappeared from maps.

And still you ask, “Where shall we go next weekend?”

The earth has spoken softly through thunder. And loudly through obituaries. This is not the season of picnics and parathas on pebbled riversides. This is the season of sabr. The season of staying in. And staying alive.

Ya Allah, protect us from the folly of our own whims. Keep our feet on safe ground and our hearts open to wisdom. Shelter the travellers who are still waiting to return home and bring peace to those who mourn under flooded skies. Let us not chase beauty at the cost of life.

Aameen.

May your weekend wander like a dream with no hurry to end,

Mani

Saturday, 26th July 2025