Praise Song for the Mae Ping

 

I praise the Mae Ping

because she has swallowed thunder.

Because she carries the breath of mountains as far as the sea.

Because kingfishers haunt her banks and cranes fly overhead.

Her sisters and daughters, her mother, this family of rivers

make green these lands.

I praise her offspring dug by human hands across this plain between mountains.

I praise her because she holds us all in her lap.

She is strong and never sleeps. She will not be trifled with.

I praise the courage of the Lanna people

who call her floodplain home.

I praise the Mae Ping, headwaters, banks, low water and high; at each bend and bridge, I praise her.

Daughter of mighty mountains, child of the monsoon

I make my new home beside you.

I praise you.

 

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