An Open Letter to My Child Across the Border (From the Soil That Still Remembers Your Footsteps)

 An Open Letter to My Child Across the Border

(From the Soil That Still Remembers Your Footsteps)

My dearest son,

Tonight, the wind is restless.
It moves across the wheat fields, across the rivers, across the border fences — and it carries your name.

I am not writing to you as a nation.
I am not writing to you as a government.
I am writing as a mother whose lap once held you, whose soil once softened your fall when you took your first trembling steps.

Do you remember the smell of the earth after rain?
That fragrance still rises the same way.
It does not ask whether the rain fell in Amritsar or Lahore.
It simply rises — like memory.

 

Before the Line Was Drawn

There was a time, my son, when no barbed wire cut through my heart.

Lahore and Amritsar were not separated by suspicion. They were siblings who shared festivals, markets, songs, and laughter.

Karachi and Mumbai traded spices and stories. Poets crossed freely. Traders carried not fear, but friendship.

Punjab was simply Punjab.

Then came 1947.

Maps changed overnight.
But my tears did not.

Families ran carrying children and a handful of photographs.
Mothers pressed keys of homes into their blouses, whispering, “We will return.”
Many never did.

Trains moved across burning horizons.
Some arrived without voices left inside them.

That summer, my lap was torn in two.

And you were carried to the other side.

 

The Blood We Shared

Years before that, in 1919, when bullets rained down at Jallianwala Bagh, they did not ask for identity cards.

They struck flesh.
They struck youth.
They struck hope.

The soil absorbed the blood of Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs — together.

That ground still remembers the weight of their bodies.

The rulers feared unity.
Division was their strategy.
And somewhere in that strategy, my children learned to mistrust each other.

My son, have you ever wondered —
who benefits when brothers argue?

 

Seventy-Five Years Later

Tell me honestly, my child.

Has anger made you prosperous?
Has hostility strengthened your currency?
Has suspicion filled your universities?

You have brilliant minds.
Engineers who can build satellites.
Doctors who can heal the world.
Programmers who write code that travels across oceans.

But brilliance needs peace to breathe.

When tension rises, it is not leaders who lie awake.

It is the farmer near the border.
It is the soldier’s mother.
It is the little child who jumps at every loud sound.

And I — I tremble for both of you.

 

Extremism Is Not Courage

My son, listen to me the way you once did when you were small.

Extremism does not build laboratories.
It does not reduce inflation.
It does not feed the hungry child in a village.
It does not stabilize a fragile economy.

It only makes noise.

Real strength is quiet.

Real strength is a classroom filled with girls and boys learning science.
Real strength is a hospital that no mother fears entering.
Real strength is a currency that does not shake.

When bombs explode, investors withdraw.
When violence spreads, the brightest youth pack their dreams into suitcases and leave.

And I watch another child go far away, not because he hates home — but because he does not feel safe in it.

Is this what I carried you for nine months to see?

 

The Rivers Still Flow

The Indus River does not stop at the border to show a passport.

The Ravi River does not choose sides.

The Sutlej River flows the same song on both lands.

When drought comes, it touches both.
When floods arrive, they drown without discrimination.

The sky above you is the same sky above your brother.

Why, then, does cooperation feel like betrayal?

 

Look at the World

There were nations once broken by war.

Japan rose from ashes by choosing discipline and education.

South Korea chose technology over tension.

Singapore chose planning over pride.

They did not forget history.
They learned from it.

You can too.

 

My Son, Do Not Be Used

Powerful nations sell weapons.
They write narratives.
They profit when neighbors distrust each other.

But you — you pay the price.

When you and your brother compete in hostility, both of you lose markets, investors, tourism, and global respect.

When you cooperate, you become a region of immense strength — rich in culture, youth, and potential.

Do not let yourself be a pawn in someone else’s chessboard.

You were born to stand tall, not to be moved by invisible hands.

 

The Youth Are Tired

Your young people use the same phones, the same apps, the same programming languages as your neighbors.

They want startups.
They want research grants.
They want clean cities.
They want opportunity.

They do not wake up dreaming of war.

They wake up dreaming of a better salary, a safer future, a passport respected around the world.

Listen to them.

 

Border Villages

In the villages near the fence, children learn to identify the sound of shelling before they learn algebra.

Schools close when tension rises.
Fields remain unsown when fear grows.

These children deserve playgrounds, not bunkers.

A mother cannot bear to see her sons’ shadows cast by barbed wire.

 

I Am Not Blaming You

Every house must clean its own courtyard.

India must strengthen justice and inclusion.
Pakistan must strengthen institutions and reduce extremism.
Both must fight corruption.
Both must reduce hostility.

This is not accusation.

This is prayer.

 

Imagine With Me

Imagine joint universities in border cities.
Imagine student exchanges between Lahore and Amritsar.
Imagine agricultural research shared across Punjab.
Imagine cultural festivals where dhol beats echo without suspicion.

Compete in Artificial Intelligence.
Compete in renewable energy.
Compete in semiconductor manufacturing.
Compete in innovation.

Do not compete in hatred.

The 21st century rewards knowledge — not noise.

 

A Mother’s Tears

When a soldier dies, I do not ask which flag covered his coffin.

I only feel a mother collapsing somewhere.

When violence erupts, I do not count territories.

I count tears.

How long, my son?

How long will inherited anger guide young futures?
How long will pride cost prosperity?

 

My Final Words

Peace is not weakness.
Dialogue is not surrender.
Cooperation is not betrayal.

True dignity comes from educated citizens, healthy children, stable economies, and global respect.

The soil beneath your feet still remembers the warmth of shared footsteps.

The wind still carries old songs across the border.

And every night, when the moon rises over both lands, I whisper the same prayer for you and your brother:

Grow wiser.
Grow kinder.
Grow stronger in knowledge, not in anger.

My arms may not cross the fence.

But my love does.

With tears that fall on both sides of the border,
With hope that refuses to die,

Your Mother —
The Soil That Still Waits for Her Sons to Remember.