The Little Black Fish
By famed fabulist Samad
Behrangi
The fable of Li
Bla Fi thus far…
On a chilly night
at the
bottom of the sea, the old fish gathered twelve thousand of his children and
grand-children and began to tell them this story:
Once upon a time,
there was
a little black fish who lived with her mother in a small stream. This stream
was flowing out of the stoney walls of a great mountain and pouring into the
valley below.
Every day, all
day long, the
Little Black Fish and her mother strolled back and forth across the stream.
One day the
little fish was
deeply in thought and spoke very little. Without joy or interest, she swam
lazily behind her mother. The mother thought that her daughter was sick and
that she’d soon be better. It never crossed her mind that the ‘sickness’ of the
little fish had very special causes.
Early the next
morning,
before the sun came up, the little fish woke her mother and said, ‘Mother, I
can’t go strolling any more. I’m leaving!’.
Her mother, still
heavy with
sleep said, ‘But where do you want to go at this hour of the morning!?’
The little black
fish replied, ‘I want to
go to see where this stream ends. You know mother, for months I have been
thinking about it and after all this time, I still haven’t been able to figure
it out. From last night to now, I haven’t been able to close my eyes. I’ve done
nothing but think. Finally I have decided that, I must find the end of this
stream myself. And, of course, in that way, I will find out what goes on in
other places as well’.
But the little
black fish’s mother
looked at her and laughed. But little black fish was quite determined. Says she
–
‘Of course, I’ve
learned a lot from here and
there. For example, I have learned that most fish, in their old age complain
that they have wasted their lives on nothing. They always are nagging and
cursing about everything. I’d like to know if life really means swimming in a
little place, going back and forth until you are old, or if there is some other
way you can live in the world!’
Even her neighbor chides and admonishes the little black fish for her bold and daring resolve. Says she, ‘Well now, little one, when was it that you became a sage and a philosopher and forgot to let us know about it?’
The little fish said to her, ‘Madame, I don’t know what you mean by a ‘philosopher’ or a ‘sage’. I only know that I am tired of all this strolling about and I don’t want to go on with it any longer. I don’t want to grow up and then open my eyes someday to see that I don’t know anything more than when I started out’.
Today’s Li Bla Fi continues…
The neighbor
looked at the
little black fish’s mother and cried, “What kind of talk is this?”
The mother fish
moaned, “I never would
have thought that my only child would have turned out this way. What terrible
person has poisoned my darling child’s mind?”
“No one has
poisoned my mind,
Mother,” said the little fish, “but I have eyes to see with and a brain to
understand with.”
Suddenly, the
neighbor said,
“Sister, do you remember the twisted old snail?”
“Yes, I do
indeed,” replied the mother.
“He was always tagging after my dear little child, the devil take him!”
“Please mother,
don’t say that,” the little
fish cried. “He was my dear friend.”
“Well, I never in
my life heard that
fish could be friends with snails,” the neighbor said. “They just aren’t our
kind of people.”
“And I never in
my life heard that
the snails must be the enemies of fish. But you people, in your cruelty chased
him out of our village,” cried the little black fish.
To make a long
story short, the
sound of their argument brought all the fish to the door. The little fish’s
words angered everyone, for no one had ever wanted to leave before.
Li Bla Fi continues…
image: bookdepositorydotcom/amazondotcom
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