Each summer, when the forests breathe green again and the air of Pir Panjal turns sharp with promise, I shoulder my rucksack and climb toward the high meadows. Trekking, for me, is not a sport. It is a return. In the stillness of the woods, the changing colors of sky and grass, in the soft cadence of my own footsteps on forgotten trails, I find a language older than words. I walk not to reach the heights but to hear them breathe. The mountains, like ancient witnesses, whisper truths that towns and cities forget.

In late June this year, I left home with my comrades and reached Doodhpathri—the Valley of Milk. We parked our vehicle there, the gateway to the green meadows of Korag, Ashtar, and Chhanz. Our destination was Korag once again, where we often stayed in the humble 'kotha' of Lassa Kak, a shepherd of rare kindness. He tended the flocks of Gulmor, earning modest pay, yet he held a quiet dignity that no wealth could equal. Among the shepherds of Pir Panjal, he was known for his hospitality. For years, he had hosted me, refusing every offer of payment.
The trail wound through conifers and across clear streams, the path narrow but beautiful. After two and a half hours of steady ascent, the meadows of Korag appeared, wide and gleaming under the sun. Lassa Kak spotted me from afar and called out, “Welcome, Master Jee! I was waiting eagerly. I hope all is well.”
I smiled. “All is well, Lassa Kak. Alhamdulillah. You are always too kind.”
Inside his kotha—a single room of mud and pine logs—the air was thick with the smell of smoke and earth. The room served as kitchen, bedroom, and parlor. I handed him a packet of rice and rajma. “This might help,” I said. He frowned lightly. “How many times must I tell you, we have enough here? You worry too much.” Still, he took it, muttering good-naturedly.
Evening softened the world to gold. The wind brushed the grass, and smoke rose lazily from the hearth. After a simple meal, I lay down, weary but wakeful. The mountain sighed beyond the wooden door. I slept.
That night, a dream seized me.
At the foot of Mount Chhanz, beside a ruined kotha, I saw myself standing by a lonely grave. When I tried to step closer, a voice rose from within.
“Remember me in your prayers… remember me in your prayers.”
I woke, drenched in sweat. The embers had died, and the silence of the mountains pressed against the walls. The dream clung to me like fog, its echo refusing to fade.
At breakfast, I told Lassa Kak what I had seen. He listened, eyes half-closed. “There is such a grave,” he said quietly. “Just above the ridge. No one knows whose it is. If you wish, Sahil can take you there.”
Curiosity overruled hesitation. I packed some rice, rajma dal, and water, and set out with Sahil, the shepherd boy. We climbed in silence, the forest thinning into stone and wind. The higher we went, the lonelier the sound of our footsteps became.
After two hours, we reached the ridge. The view opened—valleys stretched below, snow peaks glimmered above. On a patch of wild grass lay a single grave. No name, no date, only a weathered stone at its head. Time itself seemed to have stopped there.
As we stood, an old shepherd appeared in the distance, his beard white, his gait steady. He greeted us warmly and asked what had brought us so high. When I mentioned the dream and the grave, he fell silent for a while, searching his memory.
“That grave belongs to Yasir,” he said at last. “He was from Poonch. Years ago, in late autumn, he was grazing his flock in the upper Pir Panjal area. Some of his sheep strayed across the Nupur Pass into Ashtar Valley, and he desperately went after them. He searched through these ridges for hours. Then the weather turned cruel. Snow began to fall. Night came fast. He found a deserted kotha for shelter but had no food, no fire. Wrapped in a torn blanket, he waited for morning. But morning never broke for him. The storm raged for days, and Yasir never left that hut alive.
“When spring came, shepherds found his body curled beneath the blanket. They buried him here, nameless. Only later did his kin come from Poonch, searching. Then we learned his name—Yasir, twenty-five years old, who had gone in search of his lost sheep.”
The old man’s voice faded into the wind. Bells from a distant flock trembled through the valley.
I stood by the grave, the dream now heavy with meaning. Yasir had gone seeking what he had lost, only to be claimed by the search itself. Perhaps every seeker risks that—to vanish within the very thing he pursues.
As we descended, clouds gathered above the ridge. I turned once more. The grave stood small against the vast mountains, a quiet mark of both presence and absence. The wind carried a faint murmur, almost like a prayer—
“Remember me in your prayers.”
And I do. Every time I return to these hills.

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